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Russian, Serbian national football squads to play friendly match in Moscow on March 21

The friendly match will be played at the over 25,700-seat capacity VTB-Arena

© Sergei Bobylev/TASS

MOSCOW, January 31. /TASS/. A friendly football match between the national teams of Russia and Serbia will be played in Moscow on March 21, the Russian Football Union’s (RFU) press office reported on Wednesday.

The friendly match will be played at the over 25,700-seat capacity VTB-Arena with the start time to be announced later.

On December 20, 2023, RFU President Alexander Dyukov announced that the RFU and the Football Association of Serbia (FAS) had agreed to hold a friendly football match between the national teams in 2024.

However, on December 21, 2023, the press office of the Union of European Football Associations’ (UEFA) press office announced that the Ukrainian Football Association (UFA) has turned to the world’s governing football body, FIFA, as well as to UEFA with a request to step in and bar in advance the friendly football match between Russia and Serbia.

President of the Russian Tennis Federation (RTF) Shamil Tarpishchev earlier told TASS that he had already extended an invitation to World No. 1 tennis player Novak Djokovic of Serbia to come to the Russian capital and attend the friendly football match between Russia and Serbia.

Russia’s football ban

The International Association Football Federation (FIFA) announced on February 28, 2022 that the Russian national team and all professional clubs representing the country were barred from taking part in FIFA tournaments.

In turn, the Union of European Football Associations (UEFA) made a similar decision in regard to the Russian national football team’s participation in UEFA tournaments.

Both FIFA and UEFA cited Russia’s special military operation in Ukraine as grounds for their respective bans on Russian teams’ participation in competitions.

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