“Mnenie (Opinion)”: football fans will be taught discipline

Mikhail Prokopets, Head of Sports Law Group of the Law Firm "YUST", took part in the “Mnenie (Opinion)” program at the Rusdsia-24 TV channel. The program was aired on December 3, the information appeared on the channel’s website last weekend.

M.Prokopets commented on the novelties of the draft law, which was nicknamed “Fan Law”, and discussed with the other guests the issues of their practical application. The poet Vladimir Vishnevsky, Andrey Malosolov, anchor of the “Fan Zone” program of Jam.ru TV portal, and Alexander Shprygin, president of the All-Russian Fans Association.

M.Prokopets pointed out that the draft law “is not a monolith, self-sufficient document”. The draft law is aimed at introducing amendments to the existing legal acts – the Law on Physical Culture and Sports and the Administrative Offences Code. The document has been under development for over two years, but it got the public attention after the recent incident at the match “Dinamo” – “Zenit”, when the “Dinamo” goalkeeper was injured by a firecracker thrown from a fan zone.

According to M.Prokopets, the key novelty of the draft law is the possibility to introduce administrative ban on visiting stadiums. This measure may be applied to such spectators as commit offences. The period of the ban ranges from 1 month up to 1 year. The expert pointed out that the ban may only be effective if it is a part of a set of measures, including technical ones: video recording, ticket sales against passports etc. The opponents objected claiming that huge expenses for re-equipping stadiums will be needed.

See the complete version of the program at the TV channel website.