Bolivia's Evo Morales joins professional soccer club

Bolivia newest soccer sensation will likely have to play around his day job as the head of state - President Evo Morales.

Morales has signed on as a reserve midfielder for Litoral, an amateur second-division squad organized by the Bolivian National Police, the Associated Press reported. The team has a match this Saturday against Deportivo Zuraca.

Although Morales devotion to the sport is well known, the move comes partly in response to the world soccer body FIFA's restriction on internationals at high altitudes that effectively eliminates the possibility of Bolivia hosting another.

Earlier this month, FIFA ruled that the games can only be played above 2,750 meters if visiting teams are given one week to acclimatise and two weeks for matches above 3,000 meters. La Paz sits more than 3,600 meters above sea level.

That action spurred a protest match in the Andean capital on March 17 that included Morales and Argentinean soccer great Diego Armando Maradona. The proceeds of the game went to assist victims of recent flooding in the country.

The Bolivian government has also threatened to take the governing soccer body to court over the matter.

An affection for the sport is not unknown among South American heads of state. Peru's former president Alejandro Toledo, for example, financed his education in the United States partially with a soccer scholarship. During his time in office and often used his skills with the futbol during his time in office.