Sporting Lisbon President Suspends 19 Players

Sporting Lisbon's president has suspended 19 (!) first-team players following their result against Atletico Madrid in the Europa League.

NINETEEN.

That means the Portuguese outfit have just six (!!) first-team players available for their league game versus Pacos Ferreira on Sunday.

Sporting's president Bruno de Carvalho reacted angrily to his side losing 2-0 to the La Liga side.

Carvalho was responding to a statement from Rui Patricio who spoke on behalf of the squad.

"On behalf of the squad, through this joint statement we express our disgust with our president's public statements after yesterday's game for which we did not achieve the result we desired.

"The lack of support at this moment from the one who is supposed to be our leader, pointing the finger to publicly blame an athlete's performance when a group is ruled by its combined effort."

The suspended 19 players include skipper William Carvalho, as well as former Liverpool defender Sebastian Coates and on-loan Real Madrid full-back Fabio Coentrao.

Here's the full list:

Patricio, William Carvalho, Sebastian Coates, Fabio Coentrao, Gelson Fernandes, Cristiano Piccini, Marcos Acuna, Rodrigo Battaglia, Bryan Ruiz, Bruno Fernandes, Fredy Montero, Stefan Ristovski, Wendel, Ruben Ribeiro, Seydou Doumbia, Bruno Cesar, Daniel Podence, Joao Palhinha and, FINALLY, Rafael Leao.

Will the president lift the suspension by the time the second leg rolls around next week?

Watch this space.