ASIAN Champions League winner Guangzhou Evergrande has been fined for secretly filming its opponent’s training session before the second-leg match of the final.

    Evergrande must pay US$160,000 for several rules violations around the return match in China against Al Ahli of United Arab Emirates last November, the Asian Football Confederation said Wednesday.

    The fine was announced on the same day Evergrande agreed to pay US$45.8 million to sign Colombia forward Jackson Martinez from Atletico Madrid.

    Evergrande must also play its first group-stage match in this year’s competition in an empty stadium.

    The game in question is Guangzhou Evergrande’s Group stage match Feb. 24 against the winner of East Zone playoff 1.

    The Chinese Football Associa-tion was also fined US$10,000 by the AFC.

    The governing body said US$10,000 of the club’s fine is for “bad conduct (filming the ‘closed’ official training of the away team)” by an Evergrande staffer the day before winning the second leg.

    Evergrande, coached by Brazilian Luiz Felipe Scolari, won 1-0 to take the title by the same aggregate score.

    There was no suggestion that Scolari was himself involved in the illicit filming.

    A total of US$100,000 of the fine was imposed for “conduct-ing an unauthorized post-match ceremony, infringing upon the commercial rights of AFC spon-sors,” the AFC said.

    Guangzhou Evergrande is China’s most successful club, having won the Chinese super League the last five years in a row. It also claimed the Asian Champions League twice in the same period.(SD-Agencies)