Football
Stephan Uersfeld, Germany correspondent 8y

Legia Warsaw handed full stadium closure for Real Madrid clash

UEFA has ordered Legia Warsaw to play their next Champions League match against Real Madrid behind closed doors as punishment for crowd trouble during their game with Borussia Dortmund.

Following their 6-0 defeat to Dortmund a fortnight ago, Legia, the first Polish side to appear in the Champions League group stage in 20 years, were charged with crowd disturbances and racist behaviour, as well as four other cases, by the UEFA Control, Ethics and Disciplinary Body.

On Thursday, UEFA confirmed it has ordered a full stadium closure for Legia's upcoming clash with Madrid on Nov. 2 and also imposed an €80,000 fine.

Legia, however, have said they will appeal the decision, adding that they will do everything to make sure the match against Madrid can be played in front of the club's supporters.

Legia maintained that the evidence presented to UEFA could not back "the initial assessment of the UEFA match delegate" -- that the chants against Dortmund were discriminatory.

Two weeks ago, Seweryn Dmowski, Legia's adviser to the board, told ESPN FC that the club could not guarantee that racist chanting did not take place.

"We are not idiots, and we don't want to tell people you don't see what you see," he said. "There probably were some individuals who may have chanted this way. We want to identify all of them and ban them from the stadium."

Dmowski, however, said that the majority of the crowd at the Dortmund match did not use discriminatory language.

Legia were still on a trial period with UEFA after being ordered to play two European home matches behind closed doors for racism from their fans during a Europa League match at Lokeren in November 2014, while fans displayed a "Jihad Legia" banner before a Europa League game at Hapoel Tel Aviv in 2011.

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