Can anyone give me links or other information about the behavior of English soccer fans (good or bad)? I'm writing a research paper about their effect on the game.
Historically, clubs in England have had hooligan elements attached. These however, where not big, nor did they cause vast quantities of trouble. Travelling with England gave them an excuse to form together, and cause trouble. This gave rise to hooliganism being called 'The English disease' despite the fact that in countries across Europe, they get more trouble at club games than what happens in England. Indeed, after being to De Kuip in Rotterdam (feyenoord) I was amazed to see the way in which they handle visiting fans. They arrive by train or coach (No other way is allowed) and are shepherded through what is effectively a tunnel into an enclosed area, and into the ground, into an area which is fenced off. At no point is there a chance for the fans to mingle. The UK government has done more than any other nation to stamp down on hooligans, and has been largely successful. We can do stuff like strip fans of passports, preventing them from travelling. This can be done with only the suspicion of hooligan intent. It is not all bad, however. If you look past the hooligan taint, English fans are amongst the most loyal, friendly, and daft in the world. Look at what happened at the World Cup in Japan. England fans taken right to heart by the Japanese. Indeed, against Argentina, the whole stadium was decked in red and white (apart from the Argentine end), and toward the end of the game, congas where rolling all over. I think the best way to describe the England fan is that we dont do things by halves!
A couple of articles that might be worth looking at: British fans http://www.footballculture.net/fans/feat_british.html Why fans fight http://www.footballculture.net/fans/feat_fanviolence.html
The hooligan side is usually organised,most teams have a "crew" & generally they seem to fight amongst themselves. I have followed Man City at home & all around the country in the past & can count the number of times I have had bother on one hand! Basically,if you want trouble you can probably find it,but if you try and equate the stories you hear reported to the 100,000's of football fans attending matches every week you're looking at a VERY small percentage.The one thing that does p1ss me off is that the police over here treat EVERYONE as a potential trouble maker simply 'cos they enjoy going to a football match! It doesn't matter what you do for a living or how law-abiding you are,get within a mile of a football stadium & you are a "suspect"...especially when going to an away game!
There was an article in the papers a short while ago which listed all the incidents in and around football grounds. The worst offenders were Stoke, Cardiff, another nobody team and shamefully enough, Spurs. A lawyer friend at work heads the Football Taskforce in the area. The bugger is an Arsenal fan who regales me with tales of thugs who follow Tottenham. I blame him!
In almost all Dutch grounds away fans are put behind plexiglass. They also have quite some of that in Italy I believe.
What? Hillsborough was nothing like that at the time of disaster. It was all terracing, with crush barriers. It was the crush barriers that caused the trouble. For those who dont know, the crush barrier was put on the terracing, and formed something to lean on. They sttand just over waist high, and are a couple of meters wide. Its like a set of mini-goals. Hillsborough is not like that now, either. No English ground is.
1. How's this even near something that's miles off of Hillsborough? 2. Scary? Not that much going on in the picture. It takes a good 100 or more very determined people and time to get through plexiglass. And even then, it might collapse but it won't break. And it's not that heavy, so no Heyzel drama either.
very different indeed For a start if you have 1000 seats then you'll only have 1000 people in there, whereas at Hillsborough you had 1500 people being directed in a fence surrounded area designed to hold 1000 people (hence the crush). essentially Hillsborough had a terrace for 3000 people in 3 sections, but no control at all over which of the 3 fenced-off sections people went into, and obviously most people would try to get into the centre section. As with all crush situations, the force at the start of the crush (in the tunnel leading to the section) was far less than the crush felt by the people inside the terrace. Because of the fence people couldn't escape (and those that tried to climb the fence were beaten back by the police). There is still terracing in England but the capacity of persons per square metre is far lower than was allowed pre-hillsborough, and in some cases is little more than would be allowed if the area was seated.