MOSCOW, February 1. /TASS/. President of the Russian Football Union (RFU) Alexander Dyukov will head the country’s national delegation next week at the Congress of the Union of European Football Federations (UEFA), the RFU’s press office disclosed to TASS in a statement on Thursday.

Dyukov announced to TASS on January 7 that a Russian delegation would participate in the UEFA Congress in France, which is scheduled to kick off on February 8 in Paris.

"Alexander Dyukov is set to lead the RFU delegation at the UEFA Congress," the RFU’s statement reads.

The 48th Ordinary UEFA Congress is set to take place on February 8 in the French capital of Paris.

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.

Since sanctions were introduced, the Russian national football squad has played a host of friendlies against other countries, namely against Kyrgyzstan (2-1), Tajikistan (0-0), Uzbekistan (0-0), Iran (1-1), Iraq (2-0), Cameroon (1-0), Kenya (2-2) and Cuba (8-0).

Earlier this week, the RFU’s press office announced that the national football teams of Russia and Serbia will play a friendly football match in the Russian capital of Moscow on March 21.

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