SWINDON manager Paolo Di Canio will hold exiled members of his squad back from their summer holidays in a bid to improve the fitness of his players.

The likes of Mehdi Kerrouche, Etienne Esajas, Alessandro Cibocchi and Mattia Lanzano have enjoyed regular spells in Di Canio’s side this season, but have since disappeared never to be seen again in the first team.

Di Canio has been pleased with the way Lanzano and Cibocchi have reacted to being left out, but they will remain at the club for at least three weeks along with Kerrouche and Esajas, who the Italian has been less than impressed by.

Samsung Win a Pro contract winner Chris Smith will also remain at the club, as he did not have a full pre-season last summer.

“We will give holiday to the main players of the season who are absolutely fit and they can relax and switch off for two weeks,” Di Canio said.

“But not for people like Mehdi Kerrouche and Etienne Esajas, Cibocchi and Lanzano, people who earn big money from this club but were not involved for different reasons.

“Cibocchi and Lanzano work very hard at their fitness and are very good professionals and trained twice a day when they were not playing matches, but the other two asked to train with the youth team 35 days ago, and they have four days a week off.

“We did a test three days ago with Kerrouche where you have to run from 10km an hour, increasing by one every minute, and you stop when you finish your energy.

“Normal professionals have a minimum of 18km an hour, and when I was 38 at Lazio I did 21, which was third-best in the entire squad, but I was special and unique.

“Very bad professionals have a minimum of 18, but Kerrouche finished with 13.5, meaning at this moment a 55-year-old girl can run more than him, and that is not acceptable.

“For that we will help him and Etienne, and they will stay a minimum of another three weeks because they earn money from this club and if they stay here they must be fit.”

The Italian insisted that keeping the players back for extra training is not a punishment, but a vital part of being a professional footballer.

“The pillar of my regime is the n CONTINUED ON PAGE 35 fitness level, and we ran more than the others and we are champions.

“We are professionals and I would love to go on holiday, but I will stay here. Me and my staff will sacrifice some of our holiday to help them to be fit for the future.

“We are talking about players who earn £10,000 a month, and this is not right, so we need to help them understand they must be fit because they earn big money.

“When the time is right we give them three weeks, which is the rules.”

Di Canio did not rule out the possibility of their players forcing their way back into his starting line-up, but insisted they would need to work hard.

“I am a manager, like Mancini, and he said Tevez would never play for him again, and it is obvious there is a limit for everything,” he said.

“They were not perfect professionals and in my opinion they are lazy, and they prefer an easy life, but people can change.

“If they stay under contract I have to help them, because I have to get them to understand what it means to be professional.”