[Archived] Darwen end trouble

[Barnesy]

Ten Quid tickets don't help- it becomes an affordable day out for yobs. Ewood always seems to be caught out with these things. I well remember the extended hand of friendship offered to Celtic (Cavendish open from early morning) and the subsequent bottle throwing as Rovers fans tried to make their way into the ground that night or the City Blue Moon invasion-when they just stormed the place. Stewards are laughable. They move quickly to home fans who look as though they might want to boo a referee but ignore thuggery. Shame on the club-get it sorted Newsham.

[SIMON GARNERS 194]

back in the day they would NEVER allow away fans to sit above home fans.

This is what I cant understand Abbey.The Darwen End IS designed to be split right down the middle so no opposing sets of supporters are sat below or above one another,why is this not implemented?..surely it would help matters.

I sit in BBE and you could see something was happening,this is not the first time this season either I believe.

P.S.

'BIG CLUB' Birmingham...THE biggest footballing no marks bar none.

[Majiball]

I thought the whole taking Ewood back part was about only having Rovers at the pitch side, hence them being above.

People need to start complaining as it's not on throwing missiles like coins and the such.

[RIML]

Ten Quid tickets don't help- it becomes an affordable day out for yobs.

And their fans were singing to us - you only come for a tenner

[ABBEY]

And their fans were singing to us - you only come for a tenner

i know we heard them

[Tom]

Yeh they stole the 'do what we want' chant off United...

As for 'Blackburns a sh!t hole' that more or less every club uses, they must have been retarded if they think Birmingham is some sort of dream place!

I hate that chant, the tune is good and sounds good when Blackpool sing their version of 'don't want to go home' but when people are singing 'I want to go home' it makes no sense. If you want to go just bugger off.

[Gav]

And their fans were singing to us - you only come for a tenner

I was surprised to see so many brum fans, usually they fill about half of the bottom quarter, big club? My arse.

[SIMON GARNERS 194]

Not a good advert when were trying to attract fans for these games is it?

I f###### hate Birmingham no marks.

And their fans were singing to us - you only come for a tenner

You would be surprised at how many times they have lowered prices at their hell hole this season to try and get fans in!!

[DavidMailsTightPerm]

I saw people getting spat on by the Birmingham fans. Coins thrown around me, bottles, the lot. Disgraceful.

I was in the DE - saw quite a few of them spitting - but nothing else. The thing that struck me was the pure hatred that seemed to be etched on their faces. Definite throw back to football's darker days in the 70's and 80's.

Funny thing - their team is the football equivalent of their fans - dirtiest team I have seen this season reflected by their fans - a perfect match.

[cletus]

We were sat right on the very top row of the lower tier DE. Fortunately for us the top tier slightly over-hangs the lower, so those seats aren`t in the firing line. We saw a constant rain of missiles & liquids being thrown from above. Some Rovers fans did retaliate tho, as i heard several coins hitting the windows along the top row.

Yes i agree the police did zilch to stop it, but the club are absolutely stupid to put Brum fans (with their reputation) above the home fans. It has happened several times this season, but not like the Brum game.

Funnily enough tho, i did notice a lot of the Blackburn 'lads' who were jesturing "outside" to the Brum fans, kind of slinked away & disappeared at the final whistle.......those same lads who found it big to square up to families from Blackpool only a few weeks ago

[PAFELL]

why don't the club put a net up?

Why should they. The club pay for policing. Therefore the police should do what they are paid to do - remove the trouble makers.

[thenodrog]

Won't the video camera's be able to provide evidence for the police in identifying the culprits?

Didn't it used to be that people banned from their club used to find it easier to get into away venues?

[dcbrfc]

Reading this stuff has infuriated me and I urge every fan who witnessed this to write to the club and complain.

The comment about Ewood being the only away ground where fans are treated better than home fans is true as well.

I wish there was another away day in the country like this where you get the biggest put right outside the ground to yourself and can behave however you like without any grief from stewards/police.

EDIT: JUst remembere away fans have that marquee thing at Wigan. But stewards and police were hard work there.

[blue_and_white]

The other thing that bothers me about the whole DE set-up at the moment is the complete absence of any police outside after the match. Maybe that wasn't a problem when there were no Rovers fans in there or just families for the cheap deal matches, but about half our hardcore support now sit in there and you can tell its on the point of boiling over outside after pretty much every game now. There were tons of aggressive insults shouted between the fans after Newcastle, 1 copper eventually turned up to get in the middle of some shoving after Blackpool and not sure against Birmingham as I came out late but did still see some of their idiots singing "Blackburn's a ****hole" at home fans.

The police are there in numbers pre-match when its pretty unnecessary. The 2 sets of fans haven't been trading insults and abusive songs for 90 minutes, they haven't had another pint or 2 in the concourse and they don't all arrive at the same time. That is exactly the case post-match but its as if the police's hours only cover until 4:30 and they've all clocked off. No doubt something will be done when there's a large fight but as most teams bring about 500 "lads" compared to the 50 or so currently in the Darwen End, I don't fancy our fans chances at all if that were to happen.

[mark1875]

plenty of people have seemed to witness this disgraceful behavior and the failure to protect home supporters from danger. somebody needs to post John Newsham's email address and people need to fire their version of events at the club. Maybe this thread can also be sent to him, he can only address our concerns and complaints if we make him aware of them.

this should not happen again, so if anybody has an email address for him - post it! its a serious issue that needs to be dealt with

[Exiled_Rover]

The other thing that bothers me about the whole DE set-up at the moment is the complete absence of any police outside after the match. Maybe that wasn't a problem when there were no Rovers fans in there or just families for the cheap deal matches, but about half our hardcore support now sit in there and you can tell its on the point of boiling over outside after pretty much every game now. There were tons of aggressive insults shouted between the fans after Newcastle, 1 copper eventually turned up to get in the middle of some shoving after Blackpool and not sure against Birmingham as I came out late but did still see some of their idiots singing "Blackburn's a ****hole" at home fans.

The police are there in numbers pre-match when its pretty unnecessary. The 2 sets of fans haven't been trading insults and abusive songs for 90 minutes, they haven't had another pint or 2 in the concourse and they don't all arrive at the same time. That is exactly the case post-match but its as if the police's hours only cover until 4:30 and they've all clocked off. No doubt something will be done when there's a large fight but as most teams bring about 500 "lads" compared to the 50 or so currently in the Darwen End, I don't fancy our fans chances at all if that were to happen.

Spot on. I'd like to know which bright spark thought it was a good idea to let both sets of fans out of the Darwen End at the same time after they've been riling each other up for 90 minutes. The only reason there hasn't been more problems is because most people are all mouth and no trousers. The amount of fans 'giving it large' ("I'll remember your face! Meet you outside!") on Saturday was comical. It only takes one to go through with their threat though and the whole powder keg will go up.

Not only were the police filming the Rovers fans on Saturday (apparently we were the ones at fault for being pelted with missiles - who knew?), but they were absolutely none existent outside the ground after the game. There's no way they could step in if it got violent, and guess which club's name would be dragged through the mud if that happened...

[Mattyblue]

If there are going to be more Rovers fans in the Darwen End than just the 2400 in half of the lower tier and we are playing a side like Birmingham, shouldnt the Darwen End be split in half, top and bottom? It stops knob heads chucking stuff from above.

[broadsword]

Put them on the bottom tier next time and pour boiling oil over them.

I wonder what would've happened if Rovers' fans had been on top and had indulged in suck brain-dead thuggery?

[Exiled_Rover]

Put them on the bottom tier next time and pour boiling oil over them.

I wonder what would've happened if Rovers' fans had been on top and had indulged in suck brain-dead thuggery?

You know very well what would have happened. The police would have waded in and made arrests.

[Tom]

Do we know for sure the police didn't take any action in the top tier?

[roversmum]

Lynsey Talbot is the Customer Services contact, so I would suggest you use this email address: LTalbot@rovers.co.uk

[sijoco]

Was in the Darwen Lower with my 10 year old son who got hit with two coins so I emailed the club and got a reply from Lindsey Talbot:

"Thank you for your e-mail. We are currently looking into the issue you have raised and will come back to you in due course. In the meantime, if you require any further assistance, please do not hesitate to contact me on the above e-mail" LTalbot@Rovers.co.uk

Also emailed Birmingham as it was their brain dead morons and got this reply:

"Thank you for your correspondence. We are very alarmed to learn of such actions which occurred on Saturday at Ewood Park.

Birmingham City FC does not condone any act of violence/ anti social behavior and we would have no hesitation in issuing a ban to any individual who has behaved in such a manner which is totally unacceptable.

I would recommend if you haven’t already done so, that you inform your club’s Safety Officer, Stuart Caley who will be able to further investigate this incident and he would be able to review CCTV footage to see if anything may have shown up on camera. Stuart will then be able to liaise with Pete Smith, Birmingham City’s Safety Officer, who would then be in position to investigate from our end, with a view to successfully identifying the individuals involved. Likewise any information as to the Block, Row and Seat numbers of the offenders, would help us in identifying these individuals as every supporter who visited Ewood Park on Saturday is registered on our ticketing database.

In closing, thank you for taking the time to contact Birmingham City FC, and please be rest assured that we treat matters of this important nature very seriously and will do all we can to identify such individuals." sarah.gould@bcfc.com

[Stuart]

Fair play. A decent, detailed and seemingly sincere response from Brum, and a disappointing pat response from us.

Sarah Gould 1 - Lindsey Talbot 0.

[blue_and_white]

To be honest the sincerity of the Birmingham response didn't bowl me over when she denied knowledge of it in the first line. All clubs send a handful of stewards from the club and police from the local constabulary travelling with away fans. I find it highly improbable Birmingham don't already know what went on, they probably just didn't intend to do anything about it unless someone brought it up. Although having said that now someone has the rest of the reply was more encouraging, even from Rovers which despite being terse arrived at the same thing (we'll look into it).

[rebelmswar]

They are hardly going to say

" Our away following are heathen savages who need to be put to the sword and how the hell are they throwing money anyway? We had to net them in the wild and force them onto the steel coach by threats of angering the sun God. They must have thought they were small talismans of warding."