Defection is latest blow to Cuban sports
HAVANA (AFP) — Cuba's elite sports machine suffered another major setback in the run up to the Beijing Olympics after seven footballers deserted the under-23 team.
The would-be defectors disappeared from their hotel while the team was in Florida to compete in an 2008 Olympic qualifying tournament.
Five players jumped the team after Tuesday's game against the United States and then two more absconded on Wednesday night.
Captain Yenier Bermudez, goalkeeper Jose Manuel Miranda, defender Erlys Garcia Baro, midfielder Yordany Alvarez, defender Loanni Prieto, defender Yendri Diaz and midfielder Eder Roldan are expected to seek political asylum in the coming days.
An irate team official on Thursday described the actions of the players as "treason."
"It is an act of treason and irresponsibility," said Antonio Garces, director of the Cuban Football Federation. "As a federation, we are nauseated, it is an irresponsible attitude on behalf of the players because we are competing in an Olympic qualifying event for the country."
The 20-year-old Diaz, one of two players who jumped Wednesday, said once he got to US soil he was anxious to defect.
"After the defection of the first five players the morale of the team was low," Diaz said. "I was thinking of leaving after the tournament but given the situation I preferred to bring forward my departure.
Diaz is staying with friends before he officially seeks asylum.
Bermudez told the Miami Herald on Thursday that they are all at peace with their decision to leave.
"We are fine, calm, feeling hopeful of our new lives," he said. "Of course we are nervous because we're young and have no family here.
"We don't yet know the way of life here, be we hope Cuban and American communities will help us get started."
Team coach Raul Gonzalez said the players had not informed him of their decision and insisted they would not be withdrawing from the tournament.
"Nothing has changed. We'll play against Honduras ... (Thursday). We're going to continue to follow all the training programmes and play the rest of the tournament. We're not thinking of pulling out."
The under-manned Cuban team lost 2-0 to Honduras on Thursday in their second game of the tournament. They battled to a surprising 1-1 draw against the United States in their opening game on Tuesday.
Football is a minor sport in Cuba where baseball is the national pastime.
But athletes often go missing from international tournaments like Maikel Galindo who defected last year and is one of the best strikers in the American professional soccer league.
But Cuban authorities have to be concerned with the mass defection of seven footballers just six months prior to the Olympic Games in Beijing (August 8-24).
The Communist island nation has seen a hemorrhaging of its elite sportsman with the biggest blow of late coming last July when world champion boxers Guillermo Rigondeaux and Erislandy Lara failed to turn up for their matches at the Pan American Games.
Double Olympic and world bantamweight champion Rigondeaux and world welterweight champ Lara tried to flee in Brazil but they were arrested by police and sent back to Cuba.
Cuba decided not to send its boxers to the recent World Championships in Chicago for fear of defections.
