Russian thuggery in the stands and before the England game.

Ye because the English fans are totally innocent. Close Thread!

 

not the first time there's been hooligans at a major tournament and it won't be the last

no penalty of any kind

 

Oh these third world barbarians!
Something like this would never happen in a civilized continent like the mighty Europe!
...
Oh wait...

 

I'll be in Russia in '18. Just use common sense ... In general I don't like wearing team colors and being too flamboyant with my support on the streets anyways when I'm in a country far from home. In my experience shit can pop off anywhere if you're naive and put yourself in the wrong situation.

As for answering the poll question I think the 1st step is to have adequate security. They already admitted that they knew this match had a high level of risk. I watched on TV and I saw no security in those massive sections behind the goal. The logical security step would be to cordon off those sections into smaller more manageable sections. I don't advise doing that every game, but maybe a good idea for high risk games.

The other options of penalizing the Russian team is too much, especially if England doesn't get penalized. England police have the best counter hooligan operation in the world and they still couldn't stop thousands of them showing up in Marseille. Hooligans on both sides have been building this up on social media for weeks. The English also had organized premeditated intent, and even the local Marseille Ultras got involved. It's unfortunate, but it's also not a surprise.

The best punishment for repeat offenders is to not sell tickets to the guilty nations in any upcoming tournaments or qualifiers outside their borders until they fix the problem. As for games inside their borders, if they can't guarantee security there already is protocol in place for referee to stop game and home team potentially forfeiting result.

 

UEFA appear to think they largely are. They've opened an ivestigation into the Russian fan's behaviour but nothing regarding England.

 

There is enough anti russia propaganda on TV. No need to spam this place with such nonsense.

 

There was crowd trouble in Russia's first game of the last Euros, Russia were fined and given a suspended 6 point deduction for the entire duration of the 2016 qualifiers. So that has just recently lapsed.

This time there needs to be more than just a fine. UEFA will look like pussycats if they don't impose some real penalty.

Mutko says he's expecting a fine, and I interpret that as meaning that's what he's really hoping for.

 

Yeah because the video's taken in the stadium of Russian fans attacking the English and firing a flare gun into the English crowd, didn't really happen or am I missing you're point? Kids tampering with video's eh, Anonymous doing their stuff again.

 

The more police, the more control
I vote the 4th option which is on a roll.

But anyway poems aside, this is shameful. Especially considering that they are supposed to be welcoming fans into their country in Summer 2018, instead they are hurting other fans. We need more police and other security for Russian fans to keep control of all these hooligans coming into another country and acting like this. It would be a bit harsh to remove Russian fans or strip them of the World Cup. However what would be better is along with expanding police, the security can check for criminal records, especially to do with football matches.

 

Cut the goolies off is what I say.

 

Look. I know these kids. I've worked with them and I know the problems they've had with their backgrounds, and I have to say your suggestion that they cut their goolies off is the only answer

 

Russia and England both warned they could be thrown out of euros for one more incident.

 

My initial foray into this years Euros was an entertaining 48 hours. The atmosphere in Paris for the opener was fantastic - Row 6, category 4 in line with Payet's free kick. The noise the French fans made, urged on by a gent in his 40-50s behind the goal all second half far surpassed expectations.

We then got an early morning train to Marseilles sharing a carriage with Desailly, Pires and 3 of their friends. Pires & Co's banter was again beyond that I expected (being a Spurs fan he gave me a gentle ribbing), they chatted with us and another group of English fans for most of the three hours (Desailly slept save for when he was sent by Pires to fetch the coffees).

There was also a buzz around Marseilles, we spent 60 minutes of the Welsh game in the fanzone, deliberately avoiding the Port area given the reports for trouble. We did though experience trouble 5 minutes from the stadium. English fans were being actively directed to one entrance, where directly in front of us the police had to resort to tear gas and water cannons when a group of say 100 (we think) Russian "fans" (in the loosest sense kicked off) and made a flanking movement around us. A smaller separate group joined in from the other side of the roundabout (they may have been English) but we were not sticking around to find out. To be honest we quickly forgot this once we were in the ground.

The noise pre-match and much of the game was phenomenal and from memory noisier than the last 3 tournaments. The only disappointment was that we did not capitalise on the first half with a goal. I'm more hopeful than after the 1-1 against the US in South Africa or indeed the 0-0 v. France in 2012. Unfortunately, England threw it away in the last few minutes, but this proved pretty irrelevant given what followed. The trouble stadium overshadowed a good match and has no place in football.

We had two friends behind Joe Hart's goal who were among those who climbed the barrier to avoid the attack. The security was non existent inside the game and when the trouble started, whilst the English fans backed away the was apparently no reaction from the stewards (I do not blame them) or the armed security. One guy on the flight back to London today looked pretty bashed up / hobbling. How flares etc made it into the ground I don't know, ditto the other "equipment". The other point is that section of Russian fans appeared to be their main supporter block (members / through their FA), and it seemed to involve the majority - not just a smaller number of idiots (unlike outside) - I should add though that there were pockets of "proper" Russian fans dotted around the ground who added to the atmosphere and seemed similarly disappointed.

Despite this we would still go back for the knock outs if England get there and we get tickets, and had a pretty great 2 days of food, football, wine and beer. I hope everyone else has a similar experience and that we have now seen an end to the trouble.

On the comments in this thread:

(1) Inside the stadium was a result of the Russian fans reacting to the goal and the violence at that time was driven by them (the English did not from what we could see react save to run away / boo the flares from around the ground);
(2) I don't argue the English fans were "entirely innocent" for events in the two days previous outside the ground and I don't doubt there were a few idiots that should be dealt with, but inside the stadium this did not appear to be the case;
(3) I don't want to see "retaliation" as per one of the comments above - I'd hope we'd rise above this;
(4) My initial reaction on witnessing events in the stadium was to question if I'd want to visit Russia in 2018 (should England qualify) - presently I do not know, but equally I wouldn't want genuine fans from any country punished.

Other tips:

(1) No alcohol in the stadium (0.5% Carlsberg only)
(2) No ID checks, names on tickets not checked - they scan the barcodes
(3) Tickets were available on the streets, a number looked fake, but 2 groups of England fans had 2-3 spare from their group at face value which looked legit.
(4) Larger bags appeared to be taken into a storage area (we didn't have bags so cannot add more)

 

Thanks for sharing you're experiences and glad you got out safe and sound. Hopefully that puts to bed some daft comments on this thread about anti-Russian propaganda!

 

will germany be warned after tonights scuffles?

 

Just got back home to England from Marseille.

I was expecting London Olympic 2012 type security. But I have seen better security checks at League 2 matches over here than what the French/UEFA were offering. I bet the young volunteers doing the frisking down were to scared to touch the Russian ring leaders.

Before the tournament the French Police chief stated that they had trained officers ready to respond to any incidents that might happen in the ground. Well as already stated it was left to the poor untrained volunteers to try and stop the Russians from charging probably the most 'neutral' area of the ground.

I dread to think how long it would take the French Police to respond to a terrorist incident in any Stadium.

I'm going to Russia v Slovakia game on Weds so it will be interesting to see if any improvements have been made.

Also should the French team not risk being thrown out the tournament as well? Some of their nationals are causing some of the trouble!

 

English fans have been brawling with Russian fans for three days. English fans also caused plenty of havoc in France 98 which was pointed out today on ESPN.

 

Russia should get kicked out, not like anyone would care anyways. They are garbage.

England fans are entertaining with their drunkenness.

 

Correction!

Apparently Russia appealed, and the suspended deduction was dropped. I didn't know that.

So, yes, UEFA already look like pussycats.

 

what the hell has something that happened 18 years ago got to do with now, pray tell where you from?

and you are a liar, on the first day england fans where attacked by marseille ultras on the second day england fans faced off with the cops and on the 3rd day the russian ultras arrived and started EVERYTHING.

oh and the french have just said most of this is down to a professional group of 150-200 russians.

espn? probably another missinformed yank, I will take responsibility for my people when you take responsibility for the mess the world is today, because over the last 18 years you hav ebeen the ones causing all the trouble.

/Boom drops mic.

 

This is not the place for a world politics argument between England and USA.

I read that 44 fans were wounded. I didn't know it was that many. I think it would be a bad moment in soccer history if any team was expelled from a tournament due to their fans' behavior. I would also feel sorry for the players on any expelled teams. If Russia gets expelled, it will be the worst of both worlds for Russian goalkeeper Igor Akinfeev. He was hit by a flare thrown by an opposing fan in a Euro 2016 qualifier, and now his team's fans are in trouble.

 

yup thats all we are, drunken clowns, our firms are banned from leaving the country