(Reuters) - Derby County have sacked captain Richard Keogh for gross misconduct on Wednesday after he was involved in a car crash that led to the arrest of two of his team mates for drink driving.
The Championship (second tier) club said in a statement that Keogh's contract had been "terminated with immediate effect for gross misconduct".
"As we have said from the outset, the club will not tolerate any of its players or staff behaving in a manner which puts themselves, their colleagues, and members of the general public at risk of injury or worse, or which brings the club into disrepute," the statement read.
The 33-year-old, who has two weeks to appeal, has been ruled out for the rest of the season after sustaining a serious knee injury in the Sept. 24 crash that led his Rams team mates Tom Lawrence and Mason Bennett being convicted of drink driving.
Derby County are 16th in the Championship table.
(Reporting by Julien Pretot; Editing by Pritha Sarkar)