Police detain 95 Ajax fans ahead of PSG clash

PARIS - French police detained 95 fans from Ajax Amsterdam overnight ahead of Tuesday's Champions League clash against Paris St-Germain, a police source told AFP.

"We prevented a scrap," the police source said.

The police swoop took place around midnight in central Paris in a bar where several Ajax supporters had gathered.

Authorities targeted fans who "apparently wanted to fight with Paris fans in the area around the Pont de l'Alma" in the centre of the French capital.

Not all the fans held had tickets, police said.

The French interior ministry had banned Ajax supporters without tickets from travelling to Paris for the Champions League Group F match at the Parc de Princes.

The ministry had justified its decision by saying that "even accompanied" by police, Ajax fans were "no strangers to acts of violence when the club plays away and, especially, in European cup matches."

Authorities also noted a "fierce rivalry between French and Dutch fans" and that there could be spillover from the previous encounter between the two clubs in September when 80 people were detained, the majority Dutch fans.

On the pitch, PSG have already qualified for the next stage of the Champions League, while Ajax languish in third place in the group, behind the Paris club and Barcelona.