Kovac`s Fine Reduced, He Will Play Against Ukraine

The Croatian Football Association has managed to lower Robert Kovac`s fine and in stead of missing 4 matches, he was only fined with 3.

FIFA`s appeal commission has accepted the appeal of the Croatian Football Association (HNS) and lowered its initial penalty of four missed matches to three, which means that the Croatia international will be playing against Ukraine in Zagreb, the HNS press release states.

Kovac was initially given a 10,000 Swiss frank fine over a tackle on Joe Cole, and was banned from playing four matches.

This means Kovac, who has missed two matches already, will be competing for the home match against the Ukraine, seeing how his third skipped match will be away with Andorra, on April 1.

- Great, this really is excellent news. This is what we strived towards and what we hoped and what we all wished. Head secretary and president Markovic need to be congratulated on an excellent job – said Croatia manager Slaven Bilic, who was informed of the news by Zorislav Srebric.

HNS head secretary said that they presented all arguments on behalf of the Croat and the squad, adding he was convinced that they managed to prove with a recording that Robert had no intention of hurting the opponent.