The Football Associations of Croatia and Serbia are forced to fine FIFA.
The Serbian players had a flag in their dressing room and the Croatian fans had a flag in the stands.
Saudi Arabia also punished.
During the opening match of the World Cup in Serbia, Serbian fans carried a flag showing a map of Kosovo draped in the Serbian flag and reading “We will not surrender”.
After the match, pictures of the locker room in Serbia where the flag was hanging were leaked, prompting the Kosovo Football Federation to respond. And the federation demanded that its Serbian counterpart be punished, which is what happened now.
Croatia also punished
The Associated Press reported that FIFA fined the Serbian Football Association 20,000 Swiss francs, roughly 200,000 crowns.
And Croatia receives a larger fine from FIFA for another incident.
In the match between Croatia and Canada, Candada goalkeeper Milan Borgan, who has Serbian family ties, was ridiculed. His family lived in a Serbian region of Croatia, where Serbs were reportedly forced to flee by tractors in 1995.
The goalkeeper laughed
The Croatian fans taunted Milan Borgan by raising a flag with the American company John Deere’s logo on it. And AFP wrote that the company, which among other things makes tractors, has replaced its name with “Burjan” on the flag.
The Croatian Football Association is forced to fine more than half a million kroner.
FIFA is also penalizing Saudi Arabia with a fine of just over SEK 300,000 because the team received six yellow cards in two matches.