Uruguayan player treated like "criminal" after brawl

Uruguayan player Alvaro Pereira, who plays for Argentina's Estudiantes de La Plata, complained on Tuesday he is being treated like a "criminal" by the media for the brawl that broke out during a recent friendly.

"They are treating me like a criminal or like a person who attempted to commit murder," said the Uruguay international.

"This was not planned," said the 30-year-old player who participated in the incident which included a general free-for-all between players from Estudiantes and Gimnasia.

In the match held in Mar de Plata, 400 kilometers south of Buenos Aires, Pereira was sent off after a brutal kick against the opposition's defender Facundo Oreja.

The player was unexpectedly transferred on loan to Spain's Getafe for six months earlier on Tuesday.

"We all regret what happened. This will be a lesson," Pereira told local radio station La Red, even though he asked the authorities "not to overreact (with the punishments) and to make them fair."

Pereira played for Uruguay in the 2010 and 2014 World Cup. Endi