Two CSKA Sofia players suffered minor stabbing and slashing wounds after leaving a Sofia night club at about 3am on December 19 2009, the Interior Ministry said.

Ivan Ivanov and Ivan Karadjov were involved in a fight which turned bloody when a knife was drawn outside Cielo nightclub few metres from Sin City nightclub. Karadjov suffered two wounds in his right thigh, whereas Ivanov was stabbed in his left leg. Both men were taken to Pirogov hospital in Sofia, where they received medical attention, Dnevnik daily reported.

Both players were among a group of nine, penalised earlier by CSKA Sofia head coach Lyuboslav Penev for having broken curfew before a major league football match. On November 2 2009, Penev barred nine players from training with the first team following reports of inappropriate conduct the night before a key encounter against Litex Lovech, the club's official website said.

CSKA were beaten 2-0 in Lovech and a major reason for the fiasco, according to Penev, was that nine first-team players were seen partying away late on the night before.

On November 4 however, it was revealed that the players were to be reinstated in the first team following the League Europa clash with Basel on November 6. "We will return all of them, they were just temporarily ousted from the team, but I will have them back," club president Dimitar Borissov said at the time.

According to reports in Bulgarian media at the time, the club president had spoken to the players without the knowledge of head coach Penev. "We had a discussion with them until 11pm and they sincerely apologised for their conduct."

Subsequently, both Ivanov and Karadjov, who were involved in the stabbing incident, had given harsh interviews in the Bulgarian media where they openly criticised Penev as well as some of their teammates. In relation to that outburst, rumours surfaced that they would be offloaded from the team, but eventually they retained their positions at the club.