South America

Udinese's Mauricio Isla slams Arturo Vidal and 'disrespectful' Chile colleagues

Incensed by the behavior of his companions, the Italy-based midfielder urged strong sanctions against the players expelled from the squad prior to the Uruguay clash

Nov 21, 2011 2:07:00 PM

By Daniel Edwards

More On : Chile, Juventus, Udinese, Mauricio Isla, Jorge Valdivia, A. Vidal

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Udinese and Chile star Mauricio Isla has broken his silence on the polemic disciplinary issue which saw Juventus' Arturo Vidal and four other players sent home, and blasted his errant teammates for the lack of respect they showed in the incident and its aftermath.

Chilean soccer was shaken when, just days before a World Cup qualifier away to Uruguay, Vidal, Jorge Valdivia, Gonzalo Jara, Carlos Carmona and Jean Beausejour were all expelled from Claudio Borghi's squad. The reason given by the coach was that they had arrived to the team base late and in an "inadequate state" – a claim angrily refuted by those involved.

The rest of the Roja squad had kept a guarded silence over the conduct of their companions, until Isla affirmed on Monday that he was furious with the five players.

"They were disrespectful to all of us and all of the Chilean people. We cannot keep forgiving them because if we do that, mistakes will keep being made," the midfielder fired in an interview with TVN.

Isla continued to state his support for disciplinary procedures to be handed down from the ANFP, revealing that the individuals had broken an internal code of conduct in the dressing room.

"They are very important players, but in our team there are rules that must be obeyed. Whatever happened has happened, we took the final decision together. It was very painful for us, but we have a way of behaving ourselves and they did not respect that," he added.

Without the absentees, Chile fell to a 4-0 defeat at the hands of Uruguay before recovering to beat Paraguay 2-0 in Santiago.

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