Former Brazil striker Romario was named player-coach of Vasco da Gama on Thursday, two days after announcing he had failed a dope test while playing for the team in October.
Romario, who blamed a hair loss treatment after testing positive for the banned substance finasteride, will be in charge of Vasco for the opening games of next season, club president Eurico Miranda told reporters.
The 1994 World Cup striker, still playing at the age of 41, has been provisionally suspended until Dec. 18, when Brazil's disciplinary tribunal is due to hear the case.
Miranda said Romario's role would be restricted to coaching if the tribunal extends the ban.
Vasco are due to play two friendlies in Dubai in January before taking part in the Carioca championship, one of the regional tournaments which kick off the Brazilian season in mid-January.
Romario replaces Valdir Espinosa, who quit after the season ended on Sunday.
"Romario will be player and coach until the end of the Guanabara Cup [the first half of the Carioca tournament]," Miranda said. "That is definite. Maybe he will continue a while longer. If the tribunal maintains the suspension, he will go to Dubai as coach. But I think the ban will be overturned."
"We'll speed up the tests, we'll accelerate our defense to try to help the tribunal to schedule [the trial]. That's what Romario wants," Paulo Reis, Vasco's vice president for legal affairs, told the Globo media Web site G1.
Finasteride is on the World Anti-Doping Agency's banned list because it can mask use of anabolic steroids. But Vasco asked the Brazilian soccer confederation to test the urine sample with a reagent available in Europe that would reveal whether Romario used steroids.
"The urine is still in the laboratory," Vasco physician Pedro Valente said on Thursday in an interview with the Rio de Janeiro newspaper O Globo. "Test it to find out if the finasteride masked anabolic steroids."
If the Wild finally break through and win their first playoff series in a decade, Minnesota’s top line likely will be the reason. They were all over the Golden Knights through the first two games of their NHL Western Conference quarter-finals series, which was 1-1 going back to Minnesota for Game 3 today. The Wild tied the series with a 5-2 win on Tuesday. Matt Boldy had three goals and an assist in the first two games, while Kirill Kaprizov produced two goals and three assists. Joel Eriksson Ek, who centers the line, has yet to get on the scoresheet. “I think the biggest
From a commemorative jersey to a stadium in his name, Argentine soccer organizers are planning a slew of tributes to their late “Captain” Pope Francis, eulogized as the ultimate team player. Tributes to the Argentine pontiff, a lifelong lover of the game, who died on Monday at the age of 88, have been peppered with soccer metaphors in his homeland. “Francisco. What a player,” the Argentine Football Federation (AFA) said, describing the first pope from Latin America and the southern hemisphere as a generational talent who “never hogged the ball” and who showed the world “the importance of having an Argentine captain,
Noelvi Marte on Sunday had seven RBIs and hit his first career grand slam with a drive off infielder Jorge Mateo, while Austin Wynn had a career-high six RBIs as the Cincinnati Reds scored their most runs in 26 years in a 24-2 rout of the Baltimore Orioles. Marte finished with five hits, including his eighth-inning homer off Mateo. Wynn hit a three-run homer in the ninth off catcher Gary Sanchez. Cincinnati scored its most runs since a 24-12 win against the Colorado Rockies on May 19, 1999, and finished with 25 hits. Baltimore allowed its most runs since a 30-3 loss to
Arne Slot has denied that Darwin Nunez was dropped from Liverpool’s win against West Ham because of a training-ground row with a member of his coaching staff. The Liverpool head coach on Sunday last week said that Nunez was absent from the 2-1 victory at Anfield, having felt unwell during training the day before, although the striker sat behind the substitutes throughout the game. Speculation has been rife that the Uruguay international, whom Slot criticized for his work rate against Wolves and Aston Villa in February, was left out for disciplinary reasons. Asked on Friday to clarify the situation, Slot said: “He
RSS