Ukraine’s Football Association has asked Fifa and Uefa to postpone its World Cup qualification playoff match against Scotland on March 24, a source with knowledge of the matter said. The winners of the game at Hampden Park in Glasgow are due to face Austria or Wales for a place in November’s World Cup finals in Qatar.

Fifa and Uefa did not immediately respond to a request for comment. The Scottish FA and the Ukraine FA were not immediately available for comment. The draw for the finals of the tournament is to be held in Doha on April 1.

With the tournament not due to start until November 21, there could be the option of completing the playoff games later in the year. The Russian Football Union said it will appeal to the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) against the decisions by Fifa and Uefa to bar Russian national teams from international competitions.

The union said in a statement it would file one lawsuit against the two governing bodies to demand that Russian men’s and women’s national teams be allowed to compete.

FIFPRO general secretary Jonas Baer-Hoffmann revealed the “incredibly distressing” news that two Ukrainian footballers have been killed. Vitalii Sapylo, 21, and Dmytro Martynenko, 25, reportedly lost their lives in combat and have become the first football casualties of the war. A FIFPRO statement read: “Our thoughts are with the families, friends and teammates of young Ukrainian footballers Vitalii Sapylo and Dmytro Martynenko, football’s first reported losses in this war. May they both rest in peace.”

Eight foreign footballers have left Russian Premier League club Krasnodar in a continuing exodus of players and staff since last week, the club said. Krasnodar said the eight players, including former France international Rémy Cabella and Sweden winger Victor Claesson, asked for their contracts to be suspended.

Earlier, Uefa barred all Belarus teams from hosting international football games, though they could still be expelled from European competitions.