Current World and European champions, Spain, are favourites with most bookmakers to add the 2012 European Championship to their haul.

The Portuguese Anti-doping Authority (AdoP) has suspended Portugal coach Carlos Queiroz for six months after decreeing that he disrupted a drugs test ahead of the World Cup.

Queiroz is already serving a one-month ban handed out by the Portuguese Football Federation (FPF) for the same offence at a pre-World Cup training camp in May and was fined €1,000 for misconduct when he was found to have acted aggressively towards the testers.

The 57-year-old was already due to miss Portugal’s Euro 2012 qualification openers against Cyprus and Norway but will now also miss two qualifiers in October against Denmark and Iceland if his appeal to the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) failsd.

In a statement released through his solicitors, Queiroz said earlier this week: “According to some reports, the ADoP has found proof – unlike the discliplinary committee of FPF – of breach and disturbance of anti-doping activity and has determined a six-month sentence.

“Neither I nor my solicitors have received any notification of this, making – if it is confirmed – the media the first to be informed of the decisions, ahead of the accused.

“As for me, what matters is not the decision, but the lack of any wrongdoing (as was recognised by the FPF). So I confirm that I will appeal this decision to the right institutions, namely to the CAS. I will request, based on the statutory rules of CAS, that the decision be suspended until the appeal is heard.”

Current World and European champions, Spain, are favourites with most bookmakers to add the 2012 European Championship to their haul.