There will be no second “second chance”. Unlike the match against Olympique de Marseille in the French championship (Ligue 1), which will be rescheduled at the start of the year after being arrested on November 21 due to the throwing of a plastic bottle on the player Marseille Dimitri Payet from one of the stands of his stadium, Olympique Lyonnais (OL) will not have the opportunity to resume and complete their Coupe de France match on the field against Paris FC.
After the clashes between supporters that occurred during this match, on December 17 at the Charléty stadium in Paris, the disciplinary commission of the French Football Federation (FFF) struck hard. The two clubs were each sanctioned with a lost match, which is synonymous with exclusion from the 2022 edition of the competition.
Fines were also imposed: 10,000 euros for the Parisian club, 52,000 euros for the Lyon club. The PFC will not be able to play its next five official matches at the Charléty stadium due to a suspension from the field.
Lyon is subject to additional sanctions: the closure of its visitor parking lot outside for all its matches (in Ligue 1 therefore) and a suspended suspension of the next Coupe de France. The Rhone club will also have to reimburse the costs related to the repair of damaged seats by its supporters.
Ten minutes of chaos
The match between Paris FC and OL counted for the 32es final of the competition. He was interrupted at half-time after clashes which involved Lyon supporters and Parisian supporters (including some Paris-Saint-Germain supporters present in the enclosure). Smoke, fights and crowd movements near the visitors’ parking lot required the intervention of the police. The meeting, marked by ten minutes of chaos, never resumed.
These umpteenth incidents since the start of the season occurred the day after an interministerial meeting to which the leaders of the Professional Football League had been invited and at the end of which several measures were taken after what had been (already ) considered as one event too many, the throwing of a bottle, on November 21, in the Stade de Lyon: final stop of a match if a player or the referee is attacked, maximum period of thirty minutes to decide or no stopping a meeting, ban on plastic bottles no later than 1er July 2022 …
The Minister for Sports, Roxana Maracineanu, immediately expressed her dissatisfaction to Noël Le Graët, president of the French Football Federation (FFF), organizer of the Coupe de France, urging him to act firmly in this matter. It is done since the disciplinary commission of the FFF took, ten days after the facts, the most severe decision possible by excluding the two clubs.
Travel ban and commercial exclusions
Already sanctioned with a withdrawal of one point in the league, as well as two games behind closed doors by the LFP after the incidents during the match against Marseille, Olympique Lyonnais tried, following the incidents that occurred during the match against Paris FC, to show its goodwill.
Contrary to his habit, the president, Jean-Michel Aulas, opted for a discreet media strategy, contenting himself with a press release from the club the next day. Through this unique public speaking, the management of the club explained that it prohibited, until further notice, the movement of groups of supporters for away matches. She also announced her intention to “Sanction each person who will be identified”.
According to The team, this last threat was implemented with the sending of several registered letters, “Eighteen-month commercial exclusions (the legal maximum) pronounced against hooligans already identified by the club ”. This would concern six supporters, according to Progress. Nominative complaints have also been lodged by OL before the courts, the only one empowered to pronounce, if necessary, longer stadium bans.
For its part, Paris FC was more offensive. Its president, Pierre Ferracci, has multiplied the interviews to defend his club from any possible breach of the security system and point the finger at his opponent. “If the Bad Gones and Lyon 1950 [deux groupes de supporteurs du club lyonnais] do not want to clean up their ranks, these two groups should be banned. Already, I consider that they should never have set foot in Paris and Charléty ”, he said in particular to Parisian.
Mr. Ferracci, who at first denied the presence of ultra PSG supporters, then backed down (two of these supporters were arrested and will soon be tried for meeting violence). The president of the PFC also accused “The general information and the public authorities not to have anticipated all that”. According to The team, the meeting had yet been classified as presenting a risk of disturbing public order (located at a level 3 on a scale of 5), according to the criteria of the National Division for the Fight against Hooliganism (DNLH).
This risk had been traced to the two clubs, according to a police source cited by the sports daily. Information denied by the Parisian president: “When we held the security meeting, there were no comments from the prefecture. “ Pierre Ferracci’s arguments apparently did not convince the disciplinary body of the FFF, which in a way sent the two camps back to back, retaining “The disciplinary responsibility of the two clubs”.
