- May, 11 2009 -
|
||||||
El Salvador goalkeeper Juan Jose Gomez and teammates Deris Umanzor and Rodolfo Zelaya will be suspended for the first two games of the CONCACAF Gold Cup in July for actions that forced the abandonment of their Central American Nations Cup semifinal against Costa Rica in January.
The Central American Football Union (UNCAF) also on Friday fined the El Salvador federation $20,000 and suspended team physician Dr. José María Rivas for one year. Any potential sanctions against Rodrigo Calvo, the acting head of the El Salvador Football Federation, and national team manager Carlos de los Cobos were still under review, UNCAF said.
None of the sanctions will affect World Cup qualifying. El Salvador is in fifth place in the six-team final round of CONCACAF qualifying after three of 10 games. Three teams will automatically qualify for the 32-team World Cup finals in South Africa next year, while the fourth-placed team will enter a playoff with a South American side for another berth.
The El Salvador-Costa Rica game in Tegucigalpa on January 30 was halted in the 60th minute when El Salvador was reduced to six available players from a combination of expulsions, substitutions and injuries.
Alexander Escobar was ejected in the 14th minute and Eliseo Quintanilla followed nine minutes later, reducing El Salvador to nine men. De los Cobos replaced Alfredo Sanchez with Umanzor in the 16th minute, and then inserted Salvador Coreas for William Romero, and Rodolfo Corrales for Rudis Corrales to start the second half.
With its substitutions exhausted, Umanzor left the game with a left arm injury and Zelaya followed a minute later with a problem to his right leg. Gomez then claimed an injury to his hip and Panamanian referee Roberto Moreno halted the match with Costa Rica leading 1-0 on Andy Furtado’s goal in the 18th minute.
Panama went on to prevail over Costa Rica on penalties in the final while Honduras defeated El Salvador 1-0 in the third place match. All four teams qualified for the Gold Cup, which begins July 3 and will be played in 13 cities across the United States. Nicaragua claimed the last of five Central American berths in the Gold Cup by defeating Guatemala 2-0.
