France four won't receive bonus

The French Football Federation (FFF) says Samir Nasri, Jeremy Menez, Hatem Ben Arfa and Yann M'Vila will not be paid bonuses for getting through to the quarter-finals at the tournament in Poland and Ukraine in June.

Nasri was last week hit with a four-match ban for shouting angrily towards television cameras during the side's first group stage match and for hurling foul-mouthed abuse at an AFP journalist after the quarter-final defeat to Spain.

Menez received a one-match suspension for a spat with captain Hugo Lloris in the game against Spain and for insulting the referee after the same match. Ben Arfa and M'Vila were both warned about their future conduct.

Meanwhile, the FFF said on Thursday other members of the EURO 2012 squad would receive a 25 per cent cut in their bonuses, after fierce debate in France that none of the players deserved to be paid extra for their winning performances.

Sixty per cent of the unpaid sums will be redistributed to amateur football with the remainder going towards football charities, the federation revealed in a statement.

The federation's executive committee said that it had also set up a commission under the president of Ligue 1 side Nancy, Jacques Rousselot, to study 'a new system of bonus payments for the future'.

The non-payment and reduction of bonuses comes after French sports minister Valerie Fourneyron suggested Les Bleus should follow the example of beaten finalist Italy, which donated its payments to earthquake victims.

UEFA president Michel Platini, himself a former France captain and European championship winner, also backed the plan.

New France coach Didier Deschamps told AFP in an interview on Wednesday that players risked not being picked if they fell short of standards of behaviour when representing the national side.

But he was silent on the issue of bonuses, saying only that there needed to be a 'just' resolution to the matter.