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Monkey chants aimed at Marseille's black players, plus insults directed towards black journalists in the press box, have led to Uefa hitting Atletico with a three-game stadium ban - the third game suspended for five years - and a £120,000 fine.

Atletico have until noon on Friday to appeal, but that would not be heard until a meeting of Uefa's appeal body on Sunday, leaving Liverpool officials and their supporters minimal time to make new arrangements.

Liverpool chief executive Rick Parry said: "To say the decision is a bit late in the day is to put it mildly.

"We have 3,000 fans going to the game and we are extremely concerned for our supporters, the vast majority of whom have already made travel arrangements.

"If the match is played at least 300 kilometres from Madrid, it will cause major disruption, inconvenience and large additional expense for our fans.

However, spokesman William Gaillard has insisted that Uefa had no option but to impose a heavy sanction on Atletico.