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Cologne fined over crowd trouble at Arsenal

October 30, 2017

Cologne have been fined over the behavior of some of their fans during the club's Europa League trip to Arsenal. The club has also been handed a suspended ban on selling tickets to its fans for a future European match.

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Fußball Uefa Europa League Arsenal London - 1.FC Köln
Image: picture-alliance/C. Neu

UEFA's Control, Ethics and Disciplinary Body (CEDB) announced on its website on Monday that it had fined Cologne €60,000 ($70,000) and ordered the German club to pay for damage caused by its fans at last month's Europa League game against Arsenal in London.

It also said that it had banned Cologne from selling tickets to supporters for its next away fixture in European competition, a sanction that it "deferred for a probationary period of two years."

Attending their club's first European match in 25 years, some 20,000 Cologne fans descended upon the Emirates Stadium in London — Arsenal's home ground — despite the fact that the German club had only been allocated 3,000 tickets. The influx of fans caused the kickoff of the game to be delayed for an hour. The Bundesliga club 

was later charged with crowd disturbances, inlcluding the setting off of fireworks, throwing of objects and acts of damage.

Read more:

Cologne fans descend on London for return to European football

Opinion: Stop blaming Cologne fans for others' mistakes

UEFA had also initially charged Arsenal  over the blocking of stairways in the Cologne end of the stadium, but football's European governing body decided "not to open disciplinary proceedings" against the English club.

dv/pfd (AP, dpa)