Ecuador making plans to repatriate Benitez

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP) — With questions still lingering over how Ecuador striker Christian Benitez died, the president of his country's football federation said Tuesday that a private plane had been hired to bring the player's body home.

Autopsy results have not been released by Benitez's Qatari club, El Jaish, which has refused to say how the 27-year-old forward died on Monday.

But Ecuadorean football chief Luis Chiriboga said he was told the player had been taken to a hospital with sharp stomach pains, developed peritonitis and died of cardiorespiratory arrest.

The team is awaiting a medical report expected Wednesday and has promised to pay all expenses to transport the body home.

Efforts to repatriate Benitez's body were being held up by paperwork Tuesday, but football officials said the funeral was planned for Thursday in Quito and that a tribute would be held in the General Ruminahui coliseum, which holds 16,000 people.

"The burial will be Thursday in the Monte Olivo cemetery, near the home of our national team," said Francisco Acosta, secretary for the Ecuador federation.

Chiriboga had earlier said the federation was planning to fly the national team's head doctor as well as Benitez's father and mother to Qatar to accompany the remains.

The game was played in hot and humid conditions typical of the Persian Gulf at this time of year. Qatar will host the 2022 World Cup and the searing heat has prompted many in the game to call for the tournament to be moved to winter over concerns about the health and safety of players and fans.

The Qatari club said that Benitez passed a medical checkup on July 4 and came on to play the final 10 minutes of Sunday's match as a substitute.

Speaking to Futbolizados radio station in Ecuador on Monday, Benitez's father Ermen said he'd been told by his daughter-in-law that his son "had pain in his stomach and took a pill. They took him to a hospital and later came the news that we have all heard."

"We are destroyed," he said.

Benitez left behind three children

A powerful striker who helped former club America to win the Mexican championship last season and also played for Birmingham in England, Benitez moved to El Jaish for the upcoming season. Benitez scored 24 goals in 58 appearances for Ecuador and was on its 2006 World Cup team.

"He was a very special human, so noble, so loyal to his team and to us. His human quality was luminary and catalyzing," said national team coach, Reinaldo Rueda.