Cristian Romero was one of the four players from the United Kingdom who entered Brazil to play in the FIFA World Cup Qualifying match. However, the fixture only went on for six minutes before Brazilian health officials stopped it.
Romero’s agent, Ciro Palermo, spoke to Gianlucadimarzio.com (via AS) about the incident last weekend. Palermo stated that Brazil could have easily avoided this if they did this before the game and adds whether it was done on purpose.
“I honestly didn’t expect it to happen like this. It seemed like a parody, a surreal thing: seeing people who are not part of either team enter the field to threaten to deport 4 players is a first for me,” Palermo said.
“I’ve never seen anything like this before. The reasons are questionable. The road was wrong at the time because they could have done it even before the game. It seemed almost done on purpose.”
There were reports that these four players will face fines from the Brazilian government for reportedly falsifying documents. Still, for the moment, Palermo is happy that his client is moving past this issue and is ready to join Tottenham Hotspur.
“The Brazilian government did not care about FIFA’s opinion and decided that they should have a 14-day quarantine. I’m sorry because it looked like a theater and was seen by everyone,” Palermo said.
“I don’t know what will happen, but I don’t think that they are going to face sanctions: they managed to leave safely to return to Argentina the same afternoon as the suspension of the match.”
Finally, Palermo discusses the fines that Romero might encounter on his return to Tottenham, who reportedly didn’t give him the authority to depart the club and head to Argentina to compete in these World Cup Qualifiers.
“I do not know if they can be sanctioned: they are players, I am not saying that there should be a preferential attitude towards them due to a situation that we have all been living in the last two years, but there is a different protocol,” Palermo said.