The two fans were taken into custody on Monday night after the bust-up at the luxury Earl's Regency Hotel in the central hill resort of Kandy where the New Zealand players were also staying, a local police official said.

"The team was in the hotel lobby when some British fans heckled them and it was turning into a nasty scene," the official who declined to be named told AFP. "That is when their bodyguards called the local police in."