| According to reports, Dick Advocaat has reneged on an agreement with Marouane Fellaini to allow him to miss tonight's meeting between Belguim and Estonia. |
Which is causing a right little shit storm and has kicked up, sort of, the old 'club v country' debate!
Fellaini had an operation to remove a wisdom tooth on Monday and it was his understanding that Dick Advocaat, the Belgian national coach, would let him miss tonight's World Cup qualifier as a result.
But it appears that Advocaat has gone back on this and wants Fellaini to play in tonight's match.
The midfielder has subsequently refused to take part in tonight's game and the Belgian FA have threatened to invoke FIFA's 'five-day-ruling' - which basically says that if a player is unfit to play for his country then he can't play for his club within five days of the missed international match - meaning that Fellaini would not be available for Saturday's visit of Wolves.
Which all seems a bit 'toys-out-of-the-pram' as Everton have done nothing wrong - the released Fellainin to play in both matches - yet the Belgian FA are adamant that they will slap this sanction on both the player and the club.
Ian Ross, Everton's head of communications, has spoken out on the matter, saying:
“As a club, we have met all the required obligations. We were required to release Marouane Fellaini for the two international games – which we did."
He added: “Marouane said he still intended to go ahead with the operation – hence the resulting problem. It is a dispute between player and manager and does not, as such, involve Everton."
Which all seems fair enough!
But, Jean-Marie Philips - you've got two girl's names lad! not one! TWO! - chief executive of the Belgian FA, countered: “We received an answer from Everton, but we stick with our belief on this and will send a fax to FIFA tomorrow morning.
Adding: “We are convinced we're right in our decision to try and prevent Fellaini from playing on Saturday.”
Personally, I think international football is a bunch of arse and clubs should be well within their rights to pull players out whenever they see fit.
The clubs play these players the massive wages for the players yet get no benefits whatsoever from their players playing in international fixtures.
At best, there's a risk that the player may get injured on international duty and, at worst - and it's usually the case with Everton and England - the player gets ideas above their station and frigs off!
And, no matter if Fellaini plays tonight and scores ten, Belgium are 9 points behind second placed Bosnia-Herzegovina and can't qualify anyway!
As I said, international football - load of arse! |
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