Squad news
WHAT’S GOING ON WITH ZE CASTRO?
09 Mar 2011
It’s now clear that Lotina and Ze Castro don’t have a good relationship, and the situation might get worse after the incident before the match against Real Sociedad. On Tuesday the agent of the defender was firing against the coach.
It called the attention that coach Miguel Ángel Lotina didn’t have any available defender on the bench for Monday’s clash against Real Sociedad. All after Canarian Aythami Artiles was a last-minute casualty due to gastroenteritis.
After the match the reporters asked the coach about the issue, and he explained that the club tried to find Ze Castro, but that there was no way to trace him. “We didn’t find Ze Castro. The logical thing is that any professional player would come to the stadium in order to be alongside his team mates… Curiously he didn’t come today and we never found him.” He said.
It isn’t a mystery that the Portuguese central defender is no longer part of the plans of Lotina; the club tried to sell him during the summer and winter windows but the interest in him was never materialized into a concrete offer. Besides, since his name was written by the Riazor Blues on the walls of the Riazor as an accusation for his lack of compromise the Basque coach hasn’t picked him for any match. But what wasn’t known until Tuesday is that they barely speak to each other, something that was revealed by his agent.
Monday’s night game was his big opportunity for the ex-Atletico man, because Lopo, Seoane and Manuel Pablo were out, but even with three casualties at defense the coach never thought of him; actually Depor’s manager preferred to rely on a player from Deportivo B: David Rochela, who in the end was the starting choice that joined Colotto at the centre of the defense.
On Tuesday Ze Castro didn’t want to speak to reporters, but the agent of the player, Nuno Patrao, was called by all the radio stations in La Coruña and he fired against Lotina. First to all, he assured that Ze Castro and the coaching staff of Depor maintain a tense relationship, “The relation between Ze, the coach and his assistant [Ribera] is tense since the last year. But I think that in the summer everything was fine. What’s true is that the player has always been a good partner, you can ask anyone.”
Later the agent defended the player saying that he was at Vigo with his mother and that he left his cell phone at home, reason why he didn’t answer the call, “Ze Castro is always at the stands watching his team, what happens is that he wasn’t part of the list and he decided to take care of a personal issue with his mother as she had to sign some papers… they were at Vigo and he forgot his cell phone at his home… but he received the call at 8h15 CET, which means that he barely had time to arrive to the match at the Riazor. I didn’t talk to him last night, but I did it this morning and he didn’t manage to arrive on time.”
Patrao was even blaming Lotina for not taking more precaution measures, like picking an additional defender for the game “I think it’s incredible that Lotina is blaming Ze Castro for not been available. First to all, the coach didn’t know if he was fine or not. Number two, when I talked to him on this morning, he told me that he had lost calls at 8:15 PM. Normally he goes to the stadium, but this time he was with his mother. It is a pity, because he can’t be blamed for not been picked for the game. Lotina thought that Rochela was in better conditions, and is now Ze Castro guilty for the injury of Aythami? Normally, he arrives on ten minutes, and it isn’t enough time to be ready. I don’t understand how people are blaming him. It is a lack of responsibility. If Lotina has problems, then he should have picked twenty players.”
Now, what seems to be true is that this incident might be the straw that broke the camel in the relation between Ze Castro and Lotina.
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