Gillingham fined £12,500 by FA for sexist and racist chants from supporters

Two incidents of abusive chanting happened at Gillingham's Priestfield stadium

Gillingham have been fined £12,500 by the Football Association for three counts of misconduct following racist and sexist abuse by their supporters.

One incident of racism directed at a Colchester player happened during their match last December.

Two incidents of sexist chanting then occurred during games against Sutton in December and AFC Wimbledon in February.

League Two club Gillingham have also been told to implement an action plan to prevent future incidents.

"Chanting of this nature is unacceptable," Gillingham said.

"Furthermore, there is no place for any manner of discriminatory, offensive, or abusive behaviour or language of any kind inside our ground."

No individual supporters have been identified for the racist and sexist chanting.

Play was stopped during the club's home game against Colchester on 26 December, which the Gills lost 1-0, following alleged racist language directed towards U's match-winner Junior Tchamadeu.

The second incident came three days later during the defeat at Sutton in which chanting was directed towards a female physiotherapist, with the same scenario happening during their win over Wimbledon on 25 February.

"The racist abuse hurled and chanted during the Colchester match was vile. The sexist abuse levelled at the female physiotherapist during the Sutton match is as bad as the commission has seen, and the chanting that took place at that match was repeated during the Wimbledon match," the FA said.

"No less than eight weeks separated the Sutton and Wimbledon matches and yet the commission saw no signs of specific action having been taken by the club."

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