By Andrew Warshaw
October 6 – Two weeks after pleading with misbehaving fans not to push the club “over the edge”, CSKA Moscow have paid a heavy price for continuing racism and violence by being ordered by Uefa to play their next three Champions League home games behind closed doors.
In one of its strongest sanctions to tackle hooliganism, Uefa has also barred the club from selling tickets to CSKA supporters for the remaining two away Champions League group games.
The Russian champions hosts Manchester City on Oct. 21 and Roma on Nov. 25 at Arena Khimki. The third closure will apply at a future match.
The punishments follow several incidents, notably during CSKA’s 5-1 loss at Roma last month when fans displayed far-right banners and fought police in the Olympic Stadium. CSKA were then forced to play against Bayern in an empty stadium because of racist behaviour hanging over from last season.
“The fight against racist conduct has been stepped up a level — resulting in stricter penalties to deter any such behavior,” UEFA said in a statement, noting that CSKA were guilty of several offences, including “racist behaviour of supporters, crowd disturbance, setting off/throwing of fireworks and missiles.”
UEFA also fined CSKA 200,000 euros including additional offenses for fans lighting flares and throwing missiles. CSKA noted the disciplinary decision in a statement on its website without further comment.
Ironically the club’s president, Evgeni Giner, sits on a key UEFA panel as one of four club representatives of the strategy council chaired by UEFA President Michel Platini.
The strict penalty imposed on CSKA will hardly be music to the ears of organisers of the 2018 World Cup. Senior Russian officials, including Sports Minister Vitaly Mutko who is also a FIFA executive committee member, continue to insist that plans are in hand to deal with unruly and abusive supporters but so far there has been little sign of improvement.
UEFA have also punished Ukrainian club Dnipro Dnipropetrovsk for incidents involving fans at a Europa league match against Inter Milan last month. Dnipro must close a section of the stadium when it hosts Qarabag of Azerbaijan on Oct. 23. The club must cover that section with a “No to Racism” banner and the UEFA logo.