Paris Saint-Germain's home game against bitter rival Marseille will feature no away fans at Parc des Princes after the French football league rejected an appeal from Marseille on Tuesday due to ongoing security fears.
PSG fans, reputedly the most violent in France, were also banned from the game at Marseille's Stade Velodrome on March 19.
The French league said security fears over Sunday night's game were too great, and it explained its concerns in a meeting with Marseille president Jean-Claude Dassier, the club's chief of security Guy Cazadamont, and PSG vice president Phillipe Boindrieux.
Dassier felt "total incomprehension" at the decision, but said it would be "a waste of time" to try appealing again.
"I notice with scorn that the (French) league, covered by the Interior Ministry, does not wish to see supporters coming to Paris," Dassier said. "We did everything we could do. Unfortunately, last Friday in front of the (appeals commission) we witnessed a pretense of cooperation."
PSG, which plays Borussia Dortmund at home in the Europa League on Thursday, did not immediately comment.
Last season, there were major clashes in the Marseille city center between the teams' supporters, and Marseille fans were subsequently banned from attending the return match in Paris.
But factions of rival PSG fans fought each other in the streets around PSG's Parc des Princes and a 38-year-old supporter died after serious head injuries and a coma.
Marseille wanted to bring around 1,500 fans this weekend, and Boindrieux raised the point of how "Marseille's buses and the arrival of the fans toward the Parc des Princes" could be safely assured.
Dassier is fearful that Marseille supporters, rumored to be traveling to Paris independently of the ban, are at risk.
"I hope that at least this decision guarantees everyone's safety, I obviously doubt it," he said. "Leaving Marseille supporters alone, without escort, could have dramatic consequences."
Two seasons ago, Marseille's team bus was pelted with bottles as it passed PSG thugs gathered on a road about one mile (kilometer) from the stadium, and in 2004, Marseille's driver had a narrow escape when a rock cracked the front window of the team bus.
The issue was also considered at government level, with the Interior Ministry noting its concerns in a letter received by the LFP on Tuesday.
The ministry, according to the LFP, said banning Marseille fans from coming "seems more than ever indispensable" and that any other decision could not "guarantee security in such a game."
PSG has disbanded numerous volatile supporters groups from both ends of the stadium, the Kop Boulogne and Tribune Auteuil. Boulogne has long harbored far-right extremists among its hardcore hooligans and they clashed with mixed-race members of Auteuil factions last February before the Marseille game.
The International League Against Racism and Anti-Semitism said about 120-140 Boulogne hooligans chanted racist slogans as they turned a corner and attacked fans outside the Auteuil end, which then led to ripostes and prolonged skirmishes in the surrounding streets.
