The Liga MX Queretaro club will play home matches without fans for one year and will lock out groups of Barras fans for three years as punishment for violent scenes at a football match last weekend that left 26 people injured.
The penalties following clashes between fans during Queretaro’s match against away Atlas at the Corregidor Stadium on Saturday were announced on Tuesday by Mexican Football Federation president Jon de Luisa and Liga MX president Miquel Arriola.
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Querétaro’s owner group (Gabriel Solares, Adolfo Ríos, Greg Taylor and Manuel Velarde) will also be banned from league-related activities for five years, and the club will be returned to the previous owners of Grupo Caliente, which owns another club, Liga MX Tijuana. The current owner of Querétaro will also be fined 1.5 million pesos ($70,450).
Grupo Caliente will be tasked with selling Queretaro by the end of this year, and if it fails to do so, it will be taken over by Liga MX.
“Starting from today, measures will be implemented that will indicate in the protocols before and after that must be observed and observed,” Arriola said at a press conference. “We are facing the challenge head-on to change that negative image from the previous weekend.”
Saturday’s match was abandoned in the middle of the game after numerous fights broke out in the stands. Security personnel opened the gates on the field so that fans, including women and children, could avoid clashes. Authorities announced on Tuesday that 10 arrests had been made on possible charges, including violence during a sporting event and attempted murder.
Of the 26 injured, 19 have been discharged, three are in critical condition. No deaths have been officially reported.
Individuals affiliated with Querétaro’s barras (referred to as “animation groups” by De Luisa and Arriola) will not be able to attend away games for one year, and Atlas-affiliated barras are banned from away matches for six months. In addition, anyone found to be involved in the incident will receive a lifetime ban from all Mexican football stadiums.
Other security measures that will be implemented by all Liga MX teams in the 2022-23 season include facial recognition technology and fan IDs that will register and identify members of fan groups. Minors will also no longer be allowed in the fan groups section.
State, local and municipal police will now also provide security at Liga MX games, as opposed to the private security often used at games.
De Luisa also said that Liga MX decided not to drop Querétaro from the 18-team league so as not to affect the current Clausura 2022 season. Youth and women’s teams of the club will also play behind closed doors.
The league also ruled that the match, which was 1-0 to Atlas before being abandoned in the 63rd minute, would be recorded as a 3-0 win for Atlas.