Nicolas Anelka's career in international football was in effect brought to an end today after he was given an 18-match ban for his role in France's controversial mutiny during the World Cup in June.
The Chelsea striker was given by far the heftiest punishment of the five players brought before the French Football Federation (FFF) after he insulted the then France coach, Raymond Domenech, which led to the player's expulsion from the tournament and the team staging a boycott.
Patrice Evra, the captain believed to have played a leading part in the rebellion, was slapped with a five-match ban while Franck Ribéry, the midfielder implicated this summer in an underage prostitution scandal, will not be able to play in France's next three games. For his role in writing the statement announcing the boycott, Jérémy Toulalan will be barred from one match.
Eric Abidal, the Barcelona defender reported to have been one of the most vigorous of the mutineers, was the only player to be let off. The FFF's disciplinary council said it had taken note of his "explanations".
The stiff punishment handed down to Anelka, 31, caused many observers to proclaim the end of his international career after 69 caps and 14 goals for France. It also dashed the hopes of Domenech's successor, Laurent Blanc, that he would be able to move on swiftly from the ignominy of 20 June.
However the new coach will be able to take some comfort in the fact that none of the five was given a lifetime ban – an unlikely but theoretically possible sanction.
"The players now realise that they should never have done such a thing," the former team director, Jean-Louis Valentin, said today as he left the FFF's headquarters in Paris.
"We have to acknowledge that and they deserve another chance. Let's close this chapter and start another one," he added.
Blanc, who dropped all 23 World Cup players from his first match in charge last week, is understood to believe Les Bleus have suffered enough – not only from being barred from the friendly against Norway but from being pilloried by a nation ashamed of its badly behaved footballers.
The controversy at Knysna, which started during half-time in the match against Mexico when Anelka reportedly told Domenech to "go fuck yourself, you son of a whore", brought opprobrium on the national side and evencaused the French president, Nicolas Sarkozy, to intervene.
Roselyne Bachelot, the sports minister, subsequently said she had told the players that "they could no longer be heroes for our children". "They have destroyed the dreams of their countrymen, their friends and supporters," she added. France, who had hoped to put an end to questions over their World Cup qualification – achieved through Thierry Henry's handball against the Republic of Ireland – finished bottom of their group and crashed out of the tournament with the team's reputation more damaged than ever.
Today there was no official reaction from Anelka, who failed to show up to the hearings. Ribéry, who was not released for the day by his manager at Bayern Munich, was represented by his lawyer.