Everton captain Ashley Williams opted to barge Lyon goalkeeper Anthony Lopes to the floor, evidently frustrated at his side trailing in the contest. Players from both sides reacted to the challenge, piling into a melee, including Everton’s goalkeeper Jordan Pickford, who had decided to run the whole length of the pitch to get involved.

More worryingly, though, was that some of Everton’s home fans opted to get involved in the incident, which occurred close to the stands. The worst part of the melee was the child-carrying supporter, who attempted to get involved in a confrontation with the opposition goalkeeper.

Following the conclusion of the tie - which Lyon won 2-1 - Everton released a statement confirming they had identified the fan and would take action. "This will include a ban from attending future Everton fixtures and the Club registering a formal complaint with Merseyside Police," the club added. 

While, undoubtedly the fan deserves punishment and their behaviour should not be condoned, but it does seem slightly harsh considering the brawl on the pitch only resulted in two players being given yellow cards, one being Williams.

Disciplinary proceedings were opened by UEFA as a result of the tie, due to "aggressions by supporters against players".

Naturally, this seems like a valid course of action by European football’s governing body, which looks extremely likely to result in a form of sanction, whether a financial penalty or stronger.

I wrote a couple of months ago that bodies like UEFA and FIFA needed to consider imposing far stronger sanctions on clubs and nations for offences occurring in crowds, particularly when it comes down to issues such as racism.

While, undoubtedly, fines such as the 50,000 rubles (£651/$850/€728) the Russian Football Union demanded second tier side Avangard to pay are not enough, I have slightly revised my opinion on the issue. It does seem extremely difficult to judge where to draw the line for a variety of offences.

For instance, it would not be impossible for UEFA to opt to enforce a partial closure of Everton’s stadium for their next home match. When pondering over the possibility - and it is only a possibility for now - I wondered whether it would be harsh considering it was only a minority of fans getting involved in the incident. Yet, a fine for such an offence would seem to be a sot verdict for something that could have been much more serious.

I had a similar thought when I flicked through the sanctions handed out by FIFA throughout the duration of World Cup qualifying earlier this month.

There were certain elements to it which raised a smile. For instance, Bhutan being handed a warning after a dog invaded the pitch of during their home match against the Maldives. On two occasions no less.

More concerning was the fact that FIFA had been forced to sanction numerous nations in the Americas on several occasions for homophobic chanting.

Mexico were sanctioned on 11 occasions, followed by Chile on nine for the same offence. Argentina and Honduras come next with five, with Brazil on four, Panama and Peru on three and El Salvador on two. Colombia, Ecuador, Paraguay and Uruguay were also sanctioned for one incident of homophobic chanting, along with European nations Greece, Hungary and Serbia.

Clearly this is a problem and it certainly seems to have been concentrated in a particular region. One wonders how FIFA can actually help deal with this, especially if it is a cultural problem.

The vast majority of the cases saw National Football Associations handed fines for their supporters behaviour, although two countries did pick up stronger punishments.

Honduras were banned from playing at the Estadio Olímpico Metropolitano for one match as a result of their supporters chanting and throwing of bottles during a tie against Panama in November 2016. The country avoided sanctions when they then played at the Estadio Francisco Morazán, so it would be interesting to note whether they remain out of the bad books having returned to their initial stadium for the final qualifiers recently, where their national team booked a place at the World Cup in Russia.

Chile were the other nation forced to move away from their national stadium, the Estadio Nacional Julio Martínez Prádanos in Santiago. The sanction in May 2016 came after a 70,000 Swiss francs (£53,000/$71,000/€60,000) fine earlier that year, following four matches where chants occurred. Having served the one match away from their main stadium, Chile returned and were again fined towards the end of last year. It prompted a two match ban from playing a the ground being imposed by FIFA.

The move prompted the Chilean football association to establish an agreement with a LGBT (lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender)-rights group in the country in a bid to get to the bottom of the problem last year, clearly with the hope of finding a way to prevent them from being punished again in the future.

Their supporters again caused them to be fined only last month for the same offence, when playing away in Bolivia. It remains to be seen whether they will be in further trouble for final matches of qualifying.

The case does highlight the difficulty for FIFA in tackling the behaviour of supporters in general. How do you judge what is an appropriate punishment for the behaviour of fans, unless the whole stadium are misbehaving on mass.

Although, at least when they have taken a hard-line stance in forcing Chile to play away from their national stadium, it did lead to their national body seeking to find a solution to the problem.

So, maybe a hard-line stance would be best after all.