Euro 2016

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European Championship | Qualifiers

Oct 14, 2014 at 7.45pm UK

Serbia Serbia
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Albania Albania

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Football

Serbia Football Association: 'Albania directly guilty for abandonment'

By Joe Fish, Reporter | 15 October 2014

The Serbian FA releases a statement placing the full blame on Albania for the abandonment of their Euro 2016 qualifier and demands that UEFA award them a 3-0 win.

The Serbian Football Association has released a statement exclusively blaming Albania for the abandonment of their Euro 2016 qualifier and accusing them of deliberate, politically-motivated provocation.

English referee Martin Atkinson was forced to end Tuesday's game in Belgrade on 40 minutes after a drone carrying a pro-Albania banner flew over the ground and prompted a mass brawl between players and fans.

Serbia claim that it was the "aggressive" nature of Albania's response to Stefan Mitrovic attempting to bring the flag down which prompted the violence, and add that they asked UEFA to replay the fixture once the stadium was empty, or later this week.

Albania rejected on both accounts and therefore Serbia are demanding that they are awarded a 3-0 victory.

The statement read: "Serbian player Stefan Mitrovic managed to catch the flag and, as it can be clearly seen on all the footages, started to fold it as calmly as possible, in order to give it to the fourth official and for the match to be continued. Absolutely all of the Serbian players and officials on the bench were in their seats, calm and without any attempt to show force or rage because of the incident. However, Albanian players acted very aggressively and physically attacked Mitrovic.

"For the truth and justice we will not and do not want to allow the perpetrators who violated football to present themselves as victims. According to that, we estimate that they are directly guilty for the match abandonment and we expect that UEFA disciplinary bodies will register the match with 3-0 result, in favour of Serbia.

"It is a scandalous fact that the other party, with their 'job well done' is ridiculing not only FA of Serbia and Serbian people but also, we dare to say, UEFA."

UEFA has announced that it has opened disciplinary proceedings against both nations.