Gunners cancel Austrian friendly

Arsenal have cancelled tonight’s friendly against Austrian minnows TSV Hartberg following the violence which marred their match with Rapid Vienna on Saturday.

The Gunners saw their pre-season work-out in Eisenstadt abandoned after 69 minutes when Rapid fans clashed with police and the players were forced to take cover.

Local fans fired rockets on to the field and, as police moved in to stop them, they were pelted with bottles and seats.

Arsene Wenger’s side will still take part in Thursday’s tournament in Kapfenberg which includes Roma and Panathinaikos.

The Austrian Bundesliga have admitted they were considering sanctioning future high-profile friendlies in order to prevent a recurrence of the shocking scenes.

‘‘The problem is that such friendly games are usually promoted by private organisations and not by the clubs,’’ said Bundesliga spokesman Christian Kircher.

‘‘We have to think about introducing guidelines for such games.’’

The Austrian Football Association have moved quickly to isolate the incident, mindful of the damage it could cause to the joint Austrian-Swiss Euro 2008 bid.

‘‘In the last year in Austria there were more than 280 games in the Bundesliga, in the national cup, in the Champions League, in the UEFA Cup and in the World Cup qualification. There was never a problem like there was on Saturday,’’ read an AFA statement.