MOSCOW, October 28. /TASS/. The Union of European Football Associations (UEFA) partially upheld on Tuesday an appeal from Russian football club CSKA Moscow in regard to sanctions imposed by the European football governing body on the club following its last month’s Champions League away match with AS Roma.

On October 3, UEFA ordered CSKA to play its next three UEFA competition home matches behind closed doors. In addition the club was fined €200,000 (over $253,000). UEFA also announced that the club was “banned from selling tickets to their fans for the next two UEFA Champions League group stage games, which the club will play as the visiting side.”

CSKA submitted its appeal on October 15, the UEFA Appeals Body considered it on October 27 and announced its decision on Tuesday.

UEFA announced on Tuesday that CSKA will play two instead of three home matches in an empty stadium and the organization also halved the initially announced fine of €200,000.

“CSKA have been ordered to play their next three UEFA competition matches as host club behind closed doors. The latest is suspended for a probationary period of five years,” the statement from the Appeals Body said. “The Russian team has also been fined €100,000.”

The statement also said, however, that “CSKA remain banned from selling tickets to their fans for the next two UEFA Champions League group stage games which the club will play as the visiting side.”

Scuffles and sanctions

The match against AS Roma, which ended with CSKA’s crushing 1-5 defeat, was held on September 17 in the Italian capital. CSKA Moscow’s fans began casting flares starting after the 71st minute of the match and also attempted to force their way to another sector of the stadium from the one, where they were seated.

The Russian club’s fans also entered a scuffle with AS Roma fans before the match but police managed to disperse the fighting parties. Two of CSKA fans were detained by police before the game and 15 more after the match.

UEFA also accused CSKA fans of unfolding a banner during the match that allegedly contained a race-hate instigation statement.

UEFA’s October 3 set of penalties followed previous sanctions against CSKA as the club was earlier ordered by UEFA to play its Champions League’s Group E match against Bayern Munich FC in late September in empty arena in Moscow. UEFA’s order was issued following CSKA’s fans poor behavior last December during the match against Viktoria Plzen FC.

Russia Football Union’s (RFU) disciplinary committee had been recently also very active imposing penalties on domestic football clubs for their fans misconduct during the games. Security and fans behavior during football matches is under a close attention of the Russian football authorities also because the country is in full swing preparations for hosting the FIFA World Cup in 2018.

Russia won the bid to host the 2018 World Cup over three years ago in a tight race against the joint bid from England, Portugal and Spain and the joint bid on behalf of Belgium and the Netherlands.