Uefa charge England and Lithuania following crowd disturbances

Incident: Uefa open disciplinary proceedings
(Alex Livesey/Getty Images)
Simon Johnson14 October 2015

Uefa today charged England and Lithuania over the crowd trouble which overshadowed the Euro 2016 qualifier in Vilnius on Monday night.

Clashes broke out between rival fans before kick-off and again after Ross Barkley had opened the scoring in the first half.

The problems ended when riot police went into one of the home stands to separate England and Lithuania fans.

Disciplinary proceedings have now been opened against the Football Association and the Lithuanian Football Federation (LFF) over the altercation.

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The cases will be dealt with by Uefa’s control, ethics and disciplinary body on October 22.

It is understood though that the FA, who have yet to respond officially to Uefa’s decision to investigate the matter, believe responsibility for the incident lies with the LFF.

The FA sold their official away ticket allocation of 850 to members of the Official England Supporters Travel Club and there were no issues in the stand where they were situated.

The problem came because tickets were available on general sale around the rest of the ground, which ended up in the hands of England’s supporters, meaning that proper segregation was not enforced.

The LFF has also been charged over breaches of ticketing rules and for having blocked stairways.

In a statement released this afternoon, the FA stressed that the incidents of distrubtion did not occur with the confines of 'England Supporters Travel Club area'.

"We were naturally concerned to witness scenes of disorder in Lithuania," the FA statement read.

"However, we must be clear that these incidents did not happen within the official England Supporters Travel Club area, where supporters who had bought tickets from The FA were housed.

"We would encourage the authorities to identify anybody involved in disorder and deal with them appropriately through the criminal system and with banning orders. We will, of course, fully cooperate with UEFA."

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