St Johnstone’s Europa League opponents Spartak Trvana have been punished by Uefa for their fans’ racist behaviour.
European football’s governing body stepped in after the club’s first qualifying round match against Maltese side Hibernians at the Antona Malatinskeho Stadium on July 10.
The complaint was of “racist behaviour of supporters” during the match and Uefa’s Control, Ethics and Disciplinary body ordered the partial closure of the ground for their next match in the competition.
The Antona Malatinskeho park is also currently undergoing construction work.
In the end, Spartak moved their second qualifying round game against Georgian team Zestafoni to the small town of Zlate Moravce, situated 50 miles to the east of Trvana.
That is where the game against Saints on August 7 will be played after Uefa granted them permission to switch again.
Zlate Moravce only has a population of approximately 15,000 and the crowd at Spartak’s 3-0 win on Thursday was fewer than 3,000.
St Johnstone boss Tommy Wright had hoped to have Spartak watched tonight against Slovan Bratislava but the Slovakian FA agreed to cancel the game in order to help out their member club.
Coach Alec Cleland had his passport looked out but had to put it back in the drawer.
Wright said: “Spartak had a game lined up for this week but it has vanished from their website. We were going to send Alec to it but it looks like it has been cancelled.
“We’ve heard that the Slovakian authorities have called off their match to give them a better chance against us. It would be nice if the same happened in Scotland but I would doubt it.
“We are potentially going to have four games in 10 days at the start of the season now, with a bit of travelling involved.
“But we will deal with that and look at it positively.”
Saints’ dramatic victory over FC Luzern has, though, resulted in the start of their Scottish Premiership campaign being delayed by a day.
The Perth men were due to open up against Ross County on Saturday, August 9 but will now play in Dingwall the following day at 3pm.
At least that will give Saints extra time to recover after playing the second leg in Slovakia.