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246 English Fans Are Expelled After 2-Hour Fight With Italians

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From Times Wire Services

In what a British spokeswoman called “the worst incident involving English fans” at the World Cup, 246 backers of England’s soccer team were taken into custody and then expelled from Italy on Tuesday.

Authorities sent them back to England on an airliner chartered by the Italian government.

Twenty people were treated in hospitals for injuries sustained in the two-hour battle at Rimini, police said.

The incident happened after Italian fans started celebrating Italy’s 2-0 victory over Uruguay in Rome on Monday night. English fans drinking in a bar “started throwing bottles at the Italians and car windows were smashed,” British Embassy spokeswoman Kay Coombs said.

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FIFA, soccer’s governing body, rejected a West German appeal to overturn the one-game suspension of Rudi Voeller for a red card he received in the 2-1 victory over the Netherlands last Sunday. Voeller is barred from the World Cup quarterfinal game Sunday against Czechoslovakia.

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