MOSCOW, November 18 (R-Sport) - Zenit St. Petersburg have issued a terse statement calling for Dynamo Moscow to be handed a default loss for the incident that led to Saturday's match being abandoned.
The referee called off the Russian Premier League game in the 36th minute after Dynamo stopper Anton Shunin was hit by a flare thrown from the Zenit end.
Nevertheless, the reigning champions say Dynamo bear full blame for the ugly episode that led to Shunin suffering an eye injury, as match hosts.
"Responsibility for the match being called off rests fully with Dynamo, as organizers," the statement citing chief spokesman Yevgeny Gusev said. "It's not our stadium, we cannot answer for the organization of the match."
Zenit claimed the disciplinary code of the Russian FA stipulates that the match organizers must be punished with a technical defeat in such situations.
Article No. 32.2 of the code stipulates that "the club playing away from home bears responsibility ... for all breaches by spectators included in its support group."
The following article states that any supporter located in the away sector at the stadium will be considered part of this group unless proven otherwise.
The document also provides for punishment for the home side, as Zenit are claiming.
Zenit have expressed regret over the incident, while the club’s general director Maxim Mitrofanov threatened to pull the team out of the championship if punished too harshly over the incident.
