The Ligue de Football Professionnel (LFP) has summoned Nice and Marseille to explain the chaotic scenes which marred their Ligue 1 fixture Sunday’s contest was suspended and then abandoned after Marseille’s Dimitri Payet threw a bottle back into the stands at Nice’s Allianz Riviera, prompting home fans to storm the pitch.
A statement from LFP said: “Following the serious incidents of the meeting between Nice and Marseille, the disciplinary commission of the LFP summons the two clubs for the session of Wednesday.”
Marseille plan to take action to reverse the LFP decision to award Nice a 3-0 victory after OM’s players refused to come back out to complete the match.
Team captain Steve Mandanda justified his team’s refusal to return to the field after supporters had been ushered back into the stands.
“Quite simply, for us players, our safety was no longer guaranteed,” the goalkeeper told Marseille’s official website.
“We are very clearly shocked by what happened. It is for us something unacceptable that the supporters can come on to the field like that.
“We found each other in danger. A lot of our players have been targeted or affected.”
France’s minister for sports, Roxana Maracineanu, has called on football’s authorities to take action against Nice for the “intolerable” behaviour of their supporters.
“The fight should never have taken place, people should never have been able to enter a field,” she told BFM.
“There must be penalties for the club in question so that it affects the fans of the team.
“It’s intolerable because the first condition for a match taking place is that the safety of the players on the pitch is assured.
“I hope that the investigation, whether disciplinary or criminal, will make it possible to identify the culprits and to punish them as necessary.”
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