Liverpool FC Forum

by **ivor_the_injun** » Wed Feb 21, 2007 12:47 pm

First of all I just want to state that I come from Warrington, and at school the football fans were split right down the middle - probably 49% Liverpool, 49% Man U and 2% Everton, Blackburn, Man City.

As a result, being a Liverpool fan I've never been short of people in my peer group to tussle with. There's both scouse and Manc blood in my family as well, which has historically meant that siblings haven't been short of a barney either.

So I've grown up with a real dislike of Man U. Really arrogant fans when things go well, a manager that never fails to make me squirm, always at least one or two players that make you want to throttle them. I don't like Man U.

But when I got home from work late last night to hear there had been crowd problems during their game against Lille, my heart well and truly sank. I must admit I woke up today half-expecting to learn of deaths, and from the sound of it it's luck rather than design that kept this from happening.

In 2007 there should be no football club anywhere that aren't able to guarantee the safety of the fans that pay to watch a game. I don't doubt for a second that some of the hardcore Man U fans I went to school and college with were at that game, and it breaks my heart to think that they may have come close to dying simply for being unfortunate enough to love their team so much that they'd cross the water on the continent with them.

I don't know how many more lessons there are to be learned that don't involve more innocent people dying. There are clearly still stadiums out there, particularly elsewhere in Europe, that either need their capacities reducing, need radical safety work, or - frankly - need to be closed down until fans can simply turn up, file in and watch in safety until it's time to go home.

So many football fans in England thought themselves lucky that it wasn't them their team that were involved in that fateful FA Cup tie at Hillsborough. I really hope to god that we, having suffered so much, never have to think ourselves lucky that it's another football team and not ours that mourn the loss of their fellow fans. Governing bodies everywhere should count themselves lucky, and act immediately. From the sound of it last night was a very, very close call.

by **Rafa D** » Wed Feb 21, 2007 1:09 pm

Well said Ivor mate,

I was fearing the worst last night as I was listening to the radio and it sounded bad, thankfully nothing serious.

Football does not need another dark day

by **ivor_the_injun** » Wed Feb 21, 2007 1:23 pm

It's the kind of thing that transcends club loyalty, this. It's easy to just think - well, it's only Man U - but when everything gets put to one side we're all human, and there are kids at every football match.

I've got Manc mates that are ashamed of some of the people they find themselves sitting alongside, particularly when some of the infamous Hillsborough songs come into play. My scouse gran married a Manc, and my brother and one of my sisters are defiantly Man U. There's simply no way I can just bundle all Man U fans under the banner heading of "scum", 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. When the game's on, I think they're all :censored:

, but people are human beings first and everything else is second.

Fire a hail of bullets into a crowd of 50,000 people and odds are you won't hit the couple of hundred that smack their wives about, or the guys that pushed it a bit too far behind the bushes with the drunk girls they picked up at the weekend, or the guys that've done time for GBH. Death and injury don't always affect the worst of people.

I'll say it again - there are kids at every football match.

by **ste123lfc** » Wed Feb 21, 2007 1:24 pm

Very well put mate. If any of you have seen the Mirror this morning, there is a picture of a couple of Utd fans being harrased by riot police. The one falling backward is a lad I work with the other on his hands and knees is his dad. I have spoken to him this morning and by climbing over the fence in fear of been crushed he got teat gased and t watted by riot police. Its about time UEFA spoken to the governments of these countries with regard to the heavy handed tactics of some police officers. A ferkin disgrace

by **The Manhattan Project** » Thu Feb 22, 2007 12:58 am

It looked pretty bad.

All rivalries aside, which should be sporting only, the Man U fans did not deserve to be treated that way.

Many of these European stadiums are a disgrace.

by **das20093** » Mon Apr 13, 2009 10:08 pm

uefa need to check the countries in question because last night was an effing disgrace and i'm a hardcore lfc fan

Liverpool FC Forum

Man u against lille - Close to another tragedy

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