Despite most footballers being under lockdown, a number of players have still managed to get themselves locked up in 2020. Here are nine footballers from the past and present who have been arrested this year.
The year 2020 has been a difficult one for most people due to the ongoing coronavirus pandemic, but it’s particularly bad for a number of current and former pros who have been arrested for crimes as wide-ranging as breaking lockdown restrictions to committing murder.
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Scroll through the gallery above to see nine past and present footballers who have been arrested in 2020
The headline arrest took place before the world was rocked by the coronavirus pandemic, when Brazil legend Ronaldinho was locked up alongside his brother Roberto Assis for entering Paraguay with fake travel documents. The siblings have since been implicated in a wider money laundering scheme, and are currently under house arrest.
More recently, Chelsea and England star Callum Hudson-Odoi was arrested on suspicion of rape, while former Real Madrid striker Edwin Congo was nabbed as part of an ongoing investigation into illicit drug trade in Spain earlier in the month.
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In Turkey, 32-year-old defender Cevher Toktas handed himself in for killing his five-year-old son, while in France, Algeria international Farid El Melali was arrested and charged with sexual exhibition after being caught masturbating in public.
A number of other players, including former Newcastle United star Nolberto Solano, have been arrested for breaking lockdown regulations in their respective countries, while one player from Iran was thrown behind bars for speaking out against his government’s handling of the pandemic.