[Archived] Hooligans Yet Again

[LDRover]

Why Croydon ?? Where is it anyway?

My guess is because there's a sizeable Asian community there.

You know what some people are like, if there's no French to have a go at they'll have a go at what they perceive to be non-English.

Surprised there wasn't a spate of attacks on Renaults, Citroens and Peugeots.

[Shaddy]

Surprised there wasn't a spate of attacks on Renaults

There was. By a German hooligan in Montreal. Sorry

[Nayef]

Went to see the match near Broad St in Brum. Twas quite a healthy atmosphere as there were 2 screens close to each other and groups of lads, lasses and even families turned out to cheer Engerland.

However when Zidane scored the penalty things did turn ugly here. And I had an amazing escape. A rather ignorant friggin emotional english "fan" behind me picked up his half finished can of beer and chucked it into the crowd. It just whizzed past my ear and I walked away very quickly a bit dazed as to how close that came to hitting me on the head when I realised that he had succeeded in hitting a child on the head.

Congrats to that brummie.

Broad st was later closed for more than an hour as people were playing footie around the traffic on the road itself. I don't know what happened in Broad St later but I gather it sounded serious.

No wonder there was hardly any violence in Portugal. These chaps couldn't leave Brum.

[AndyC]

Well here's my tuppence worth!

I arrived in Lisbon Saturday morning and spent the weekend.

The atomsphere everywhere was incredible. We tended to stay around small bars, mixing with some of the locals, playing football etc etc.

Over in the main square, there must have been about 5000 england fans singing, drinking and kicking footballs all day. Quite a few drunk, but the only crimes being comitted were signing en ger lund out of tune!

I'll post some pics up later, but we had turned the whole square into a sea of st georges. It really did look amazing!

The locals were going up to groups of lads and asking to have there photos taken. Hardly the act of someone quaking in their boots!

The only trouble I saw in the ground, was a minor scuffle in the stadium when france went 2-1 up. There were quite a few english in the french areas and vice versa, but the police moved in quickly and sorted it out.

I've also got to praise the police in the city centre. They stayed well out of the way and didn't look menacing ( unlike france 98) , but you had the feeling that if anything kicked off - they would be there very quickly.

As others have pointed out, you will always get a minority of people willing to do stupid things, but it has to be put into context.

AT one point in the afternoon, a very drunk portugese man was stumbling / trying to run into the square with a big piece of 2x2. His 2 friends ran after him and pulled him back. Goodness knows what would have happened, but yet again - it was just the action of a mindless idiot. ( I might have a picture of him, so Ill post it if I have! He was quite a state!)

Finally, on the saturday night, we went into the main portugese area for drinks and again, there were a lot of english in the bars along with many different nationalities. no problems whatsoever.

If we lose to croatia or switzerland, then it may be a different story, but on the whole I thought the fans behaved very well indeed.

[Oklahoma]

No big problems so far!!!

AndyC, will you be in Porto tomorrow?

Me, Mushy and Waggy will meet tomorrow in porto centre.

I already met Mushy today. Great guy.

Even took a photo with BRFC flag

[Rover_Shaun]

Funny how the english press are playing down what happened last night. Nothing on bbc.co.uk and apparently 'minor scuffles' ocurred accrding to sky.com/news (playing it down as if it was ok - unbelievable!). In case you dont know as it's not being reported over there much but a group of english 'fans' threw a gas cannister into the middle of a popular local event in Lisbon at about 1am in the morning. It was a procession i think and Marca reported that people experienced breathing difficulties and eye irritations. Not many were arrested as they managed to get away from riot police.

It really makes me angry that people are sick enough to do this, they obviously have very sad and boring lives if they call this their idea of fun, and I know the excuse will be that they had been drinking, but if thats what you do when you drink then you shouldnt drink at all. Disgusted.

I am sure that all the fans involved won't do it again now they now that Mr Blunkett is 'keeping an eye on them'

[Billy Castell]

Mr. Blunkett 'keeping an eye' on them ?. Am I missing something here...........??

Edited June 14, 2004 by Billy Castell

[Rover_Shaun]

WOOOOSH!!

[Baz]

I was listening to Century Radio this morning and they where interviewing a guy who had been at the game yesterday and just flown home - he said the atmosphere both before during and also after the game was great.

He also said that a Portuguese tv crew brought a group of approx 50 french fans into the central square and got them to start a few chants to wind up the england fans - who apparently did nothing than out-sing the french - responsible unbiased media?

[Anti Euro Smiths Fan]

As well as in Croydon where four hundred people were involved in a serious incident - slinging missiles and bottles at police and attacking a tram, in the centre of Birmingham a giant TV screen was smashed by yobs hurling bottles and even their shoes.

There were reported disturbances in Watford, Stevenage, Wakefield and Bromley.

In Liverpool (surprise surprise) , yobs smashed car windows and threw tables and chairs at each other after the match.

The important point as far as I'm concerned is that this is a society problem rather than a football one. If the game of football had never been invented, we would still have these thugs about causing a menace in society. The beautiful game itself shouldn't get the blame for our unfortunate social ills.

It's also important to remember that this is far from just being an "English" problem - there are similar yobs in many other countries abroad.

[Rover_Shaun]

the big screen area was rammed (but not my cuppa as it's an alcohol free zone, prefer the pub) and there wasn't a sausage of trouble in Manchester...............just loony tunes jumping in the fountain out side the town hall.

[Glenn]

We spoke to soon.

I just caught a snippet on Sky News talking about 200 England fans clashing with police in Portugal.

I've no real details yet, but the pictures didn't look good.

Additional - http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/3807427.stm

"Around 200 fans, some English, 11 arrests". Whilst not good it doesn't sounds as bad as it initially sounded for us.

[roversWASmylife]

We spoke to soon.

I just caught a snippet on Sky News talking about 200 England fans clashing with police in Portugal.

Same here. Isn’t looking good at all. I don’t know what UEFA will do.

It looked as like several bars had been broken, windows smashed, chairs all over the place. I can’t see the point myself, why these “fans” want to go out and do it.

It’s the minority who spoil it for everyone else. Possibly could result in England’s allocation being reduced for a game.

No wonder foreigners tar English fans with the same brush.

And I bet the “fans” complaining that we don’t get enough tickets because we have been given a reduced amount because of the trouble, will be the ones who caused chaos last night, or at least a small number of them.

I hope they feel better about themselves now.......

[Glenn]

After a quick look around the news sites, it seems there is no real info on this other that 10 second of footage of riot police talking to two drunk looking fans outside a bar with lots of shouting on the soundtrack.

Seems odd, but at such a popular resort, with modern reporting, 7 hours laster and there are no real reports, just press agencies running empty stories around 3 facts (200 fans, some english 11 arrests).

Seems fishy at the mo, but I guess we'll have to wait for the independant eye-witness reports to come in.

[Paul]

It's reported on Five Live as 12 people DETAINED rather than arrested. Two England club members interviewed, who saw the incidents from their hotel balcony, suggested the atmosphere had been building for 4-5 hours and that the police over-reacted to a bottle and chair being thrown. The suggestion being that innocent people were hit by olice with at least two women taken by ambulance to hospital. Also suggested that police quickly adopted a zero-tolerance policy and made it difficult for fans to go about what was thought to be their normal business of returning to hotels etc.

[greggyk]

a russian and some portugal fans were also detained.

Sounds like the begining of a joke

[ptholt]

From what i've heard locally (Albufeira is about 20 minutes away) the local policing policy in Albufeira, is different to the rest of Portugal, because Albufeira at this time of year is crammed with young brits who go round pubs, bars disco's and stay out all hours and is a very English resort, the policing there is more of an english nature.

As such in Lisboa the police are being fairly low key, in Albufeira its very much a large physical very obvious english style policing with guys in riot gear and horses on the street corners, could be a lesson learned there perhaps.

[Paul]

Also, according to Five Live, the police in question are effectively riot police who, in the words of the Five Live presenter, "go around heavily tooled up" and a number of the officers have served time in Iraq.

Might be an idea to drink elsewhere?

[ptholt]

Albufeira has obviously been ear marked as a potential trouble spot due to its english nature, as i live very close to the coast and haven't seen any police in riot gear or with horses anywhere else.

So rather than go into Albufeira (which is rather like Blackpool with sun and sand tbh) i would recommend people try other coast based towns instead.

[Rover_Shaun]

Isn’t looking good at all. I don’t know what UEFA will do.

Don't get your knick-knacks in a twist as UEFA have already withdrawn their 'hollow' threat to expel England if there was any 'media over-exagerated and over-hyped' trouble.

[AndyC]

No big problems so far!!!

AndyC, will you be in Porto tomorrow?

Me, Mushy and Waggy will meet tomorrow in porto centre.

I already met Mushy today. Great guy.

Even took a photo with BRFC flag

unfortunately not. i'm back in blighty now!

[Ninjathunder]

It's reported on Five Live as 12 people DETAINED rather than arrested.

Maybe I'm being thick here, Paul. Please would you explain the difference?

[Lathund]

It's reported on Five Live as 12 people DETAINED rather than arrested. Two England club members interviewed, who saw the incidents from their hotel balcony, suggested the atmosphere had been building for 4-5 hours and that the police over-reacted to a bottle and chair being thrown. The suggestion being that innocent people were hit by olice with at least two women taken by ambulance to hospital. Also suggested that police quickly adopted a zero-tolerance policy and made it difficult for fans to go about what was thought to be their normal business of returning to hotels etc.

And then the police has a completely different version of it.

Can't really trust either "side" to tell the truth in incidents like this.

[Blackburn Ender]

It means they have merely been held in custody and NOT charged with any offences.

It is not even as serious as "being questioned by police...".

Chances are the dozen were taken away either for their own safety, for being drunk, to prevent them from causing a disturbance or because they were simply "in the way."

[1864roverite]

the media are just as big a culprit as the idiots who are causing trouble IMO

they sensationalise

they create media nonsense

they under report the TRUE facts

they never give any credit to English fans

and finally

they NEVER report on the other idiotic followers of other countries who cause mayhem