Discipline for bending to ultras

(ANSA) - Milan, May 4 - Professional soccer players in Italy could face disciplinary action as severe as disqualification for submitting to demands from hard-core 'ultra' fans, the head of the players association said Monday.
    "No more blatant submissions or showdowns between players and fans," said Damiano Tommasi, president of the professional players association AIC.
    He spoke following a meeting on the topic of pressure by hard-core fans to bend players' behaviour during matches.
    Games are increasingly being marred by a series of violent episodes which many experts say are the result of the excessive power many ultra groups of hardcore fans have gained.
    There have been several incidents of players and clubs cowering to the ultras, rather than risk angering them.
    That includes a 2012 match when Genoa fans managed to get the game suspended by throwing smoke bombs and intimidated their team to remove their shirts following a poor run of form because the players were supposedly unfit to wear them.
    "I'm tired of this," Giovanni Malago', the head of the Italian Olympic Committee (CONI). said recently.
    "The punishments given by the sporting judge (to clubs whose fans misbehave) are not sufficient to change some people's attitudes.
    Italian governments and the Italian Soccer Federation (FIGC) have, in fact, repeatedly stiffened punishments for offenders and their clubs in cases of football-related violence and racism, but to little avail.
    Some commentators argue that the a big part of the problem is how the measures are applied.