Italian League One’s side Swindon Town’s manager Di Canio wants his players to be fined for their worst performance in a league match whereby they were surprisingly defeated by Macclesfield Town by 2-0. The legendry Di Canio, the former player of Swindon Town who has as many as 500 league appearances for the club, could not simply believe that his team can be thrown out in this fashion. The most important reason of his anger was Swindon’s substitute central midfielder: Louis Thompson, who put the ball in his own net at 90th minute though Macclesfield Town was already leading the match by then by 1-0, only goal by that time was fired by defender Tony Diagne in 63rd minute. Furious manager also asked his team to attend the training camp in early morning on Sunday. Despite his aggressive reaction to this defeat, it is very much unlikely that he would be able to impose any fine or salary cut on players coz of players protection guidelines which protect each player’s rights in case of poor performance, if there is no match fixing involved.
Di Canio said after the defeat, “I would like to fine my players, but it may not be possible because they have too much protection. When I tell players they are average they get angry, but that was the case here. Now the club has to say sorry to everybody because they have damaged themselves.” He also added, “For three days after Villa I was happy. Now I am angry. On Sunday at 7.30am we will be training at Liddington and Di Canio will be the first to arrive.I know how to manage my players. Sometimes they think they are Barcelona players, but they are not.”
Actually, Di Canio is known for his losing control when his team is down, perhaps, he also busted up with his own striker Leon Clarke right on the pitch when Swindon Town was defeated by Southampton in the last season. Noticeably, Di Canio made six changes from his earlier team that lost to Villa, though none of the changes was high profile. On the other side, Macclesfield boss Steve King cheered his win and said, “This is massive for us and our fans. Look at the gulf between the clubs. Last year we were in the same division but now they are looking to get into the Championship. Days like this you can only dream about and we will all savour it while we can. I am proud of the team and my players because they gave me everything.”