Football
Tom Marshall, Mexico correspondent 6y

Tigres manager Ricardo 'Tuca' Ferretti criticises Liga MX's new minor rule

Tigres manager Ricardo "Tuca" Ferretti isn't guaranteeing to fulfill the Liga MX's new minor rule and hinted his club may just take the three-point penalty instead.

Liga MX brought in a rule stating each club must give under-21 players at least 765 minutes of playing time during the current Apertura regular season, which would rise to 1000 by the 2019 Clausura. The idea is to hand more Mexican youngsters more opportunities in a league that has seen a rise in foreigners.

Ferretti has been a consistent critic of the league forcing clubs to field youngsters and suggested the recently announced three-point penalty may not be enough to dissuade clubs from breaking it.

"We still have time to look at the situation and naturally we should comply with the rule, if you don't you lose three points," said Ferretti in a press conference on Monday. "We could say that we could play 16 games and lose one if I don't use [the youngster rule]."

"It's a possibility, I don't deny that it is a possibility."

Ferretti said that the youngster rule will lead to more debuts for youngsters, but suggested those players may not be ready for them and it could actually backfire.

"Youngsters have to play because they are ready and because they have talent and are adequately trained," he said. "For example, the boy Jonathan [Gonzalez from Monterrey] has talent and is well-trained, so he had to play, he played and then [won] rookie of the year and everything.

"Those are the players that we should produce and they won't come out because [the league] imposes [a rule]. That's what I think. There will be a lot of debuts, but a lot of firings as well because if [the youngsters] aren't talented and trained maybe they will be there for a year and later we'll never hear of them again."

Ferretti's Tigres are reigning Liga MX Under-20s champions and the Brazilian did bring on 21-year-old midfielder Raul Torres for nine minutes of his team's 2-0 opening day victory over Leon last Saturday.

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