bobzy Posted April 27, 2017 Share Posted April 27, 2017 I don't really know where to put anything like this, and it's a blessing that the days of hooliganism past are gone to an extent, but I don't understand the mindless violence involved in football. It's just a game! This thread basically came from the news that: "Doctors fear a Tottenham Hotspur fan could be left with permanent damage to his eyesight, following an attack in which police think a fellow Spurs fan mistook him for a Chelsea supporter." (Link: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-london-39729568) ...coupled with our recent game against Blues which, thankfully, seems to have happened without incident - something I didn't think would happen. It got me thinking, though... what is behind such cowardly attacks? Further, why do they seem to only occur (in the UK, at least) in football-related circles? Why is the underpinning of the game a group of supporters who seemingly cannot help but be aggressive and/or violent? Even when there's no violence at football matches; the chants are often abusive and expletive-laden, the scoring of a goal leads to the "happy" supporters goading the "unhappy" supporters rather than only celebrating and if the referee gets something wrong (God forbid), he is also subject to vile abuse. Swap the sport for rugby or cricket and the mood amongst fans is much more jovial. You get some "banter" (in cricket, it's probably worse on the pitch than in the stands) but the supporters mix together with no issue. Drinking alcohol is par for the course, completely expected. Incidents just don't happen. I guess this extends further to... has anyone on here ever been caught up in violence at a football game or elsewhere purely because of a football rivalry? If so, have you encouraged it or just been wrong place, wrong time? It's something I really hate about the sport I love and I can't get my head around it. The last time I attended a home game, I was sat next to someone who basically had what I can only describe as "Westwood tourettes". Every time the guy touched the ball, he couldn't wait to spew "**** Westwood you **** word removed, useless **** word removed". Why is it all so prevalent?! 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
villa4europe Posted April 27, 2017 Share Posted April 27, 2017 It's the same as always, football is a microcosm of society, if you look at social media and society in general what is currently all over the shop? LAD lad culture + football are made for each other and it's dangerous the thing that annoys me is when football bears the brunt of something that's shit, violent behaviour, racism, homophobia etc none of these are accepted or more acceptable in football, that's a myth but I personally think at times were treated like 2nd class citizens, the problem being people live up to it the reality is those Spurs fans who attacked the other fan are dickheads, Sunday to Friday they're dickheads, Saturday they go to the football and they're a dickhead but no one cares about the other 6 days a week 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bobzy Posted April 28, 2017 Author Share Posted April 28, 2017 Yes, absolutely fair. But why isn't that a thing for other sports? Can you recall an incident where, say, "Leicester Tigers fan attacks Saracens fan after Twickenhan final"? Rugby players are absolute "lads" when it comes to nights out and my experience is certainly that they wouldn't back out of a fight. However, they don't seem to start or look for trouble as such. Dickheads will be dickheads - completely agree. Why does football seem to be the only sport that suffers with this though? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
villa_shere Posted April 28, 2017 Share Posted April 28, 2017 I think society forget football is a working class sport. VERY generally speaking the kind of people who kick off probably drink in the kind of boozers in the kind of parts of the town most wouldn't be likely to visit. Go out to a major town centre on any given weekend and there would be just as much trouble if not more than at a football game. Football has tribalism, mix this with alcohol and you get a rowdy bunch of people. Some people find this outlet as the only way of being able to express themselves. Likely someone will post 'what about the dr/lawyer/solicitor' whose part of a "firm", but the numbers compared to the working class pale insignificant. 3 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
villa_shere Posted April 28, 2017 Share Posted April 28, 2017 BTW this also happens at MMA/Boxing events, especially the lower level of shows. 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
villa4europe Posted April 28, 2017 Share Posted April 28, 2017 the rugby comparison comes up a lot and i know what you're saying but my argument is that if you picture the local scallies from where you live, round by me they're something like this - They're not rugby fans, they arent going to rugby games causing trouble because they arent going to rugby games full stop my issue with it all is the suggestion that football is the source of the problem, thats not necessarily true, i think football is just a catalyst for the behaviour Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Grasshopper Posted April 28, 2017 Share Posted April 28, 2017 I think it's a bit more about how one see's football. I only ever played School and junior Sunday league with the occasional football club training sessions/trails. But my ambition was to be a professional footballer, I didn't make it unfortunately, but anyway I "see" football as a sport. As an artist, I also look for the "art & creativity" in football, I look for skill, flair and inspiration. I feel honoured to witness such a goal like Brian Littles diving header v ManU or Benno's v Leeds (FA cup) Yorke's hattrick goal v toon. I see a lot of yobs who are at games for the tribalism rather than the spectacle. Sad when one can't see the essence of the game because of the need for Neanderthalism 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
blandy Posted April 28, 2017 Moderator Share Posted April 28, 2017 2 hours ago, bobzy said: Why does football seem to be the only sport that suffers with this though? That part is not not right at all. It's very very wrong. Boxing, Rugby League, Cricket, Baseball... google almost any sport + crowd trouble and you get to see the picture. And it's not a uniquely English or British problem, e.g Baseball - http://www.cbssports.com/general/news/serious-fan-violence-taking-on-life-of-its-own-can-it-be-stopped/ Quote The NFL is failing, if only because failure is unavoidable. Put 70,000 people in a confined space, add alcohol and testosterone -- estrogen, too -- and multiply that by the surge of adrenaline that comes from being emotionally invested in the game, and violence is going to happen. It happened in a scary way Sunday, when fans went tumbling down a flight of concrete stairs at the 49ers-Cardinals game at University of Phoenix Stadium in Glendale, Ariz. Men and women in red jerseys were throwing punches, and a single security officer in a light blue shirt was stuck in the middle, getting hit and even choked, and when the melee was broken up and the stairway was cleared, the steps were splattered with blood. Same day, different state, more violence. It was Redskins-Eagles at Lincoln Financial Field in Philadelphia, and at least six different fans were beating the hell out of each other when they went flying over several rows of chairs, landing on a man who had nothing to do with the fight but was smashed between a hard chair and several hundred pounds of roiling humanity. Football gets most of the media focus due to it's dominating popularity in this country. The problem is basically human beings. 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AJ Posted April 28, 2017 Share Posted April 28, 2017 I don't get it. Sorry. How does beating the shit out of someone show how much you love football, and that you really support your team? What is even worse, is when these "brave" men target women and kids, simply because they don't like what they are wearing. Correct me if I am wrong, but could it be because these people are normally piss weak bastards during their normal day to day life, and the dutch courage of match day is an excuse to try and convince themselves they are not, by going for people not expecting to be hit, or soft targets such as women, kids, or people smaller than them? If that is the case, they should be blinded and let loose in the wild. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
turvontour Posted April 28, 2017 Share Posted April 28, 2017 In most football violence incidents you generally have no more than 10-20 people actually involved in the fighting, but you have a huge fringe of 50-100 who are there as “back up” but generally won’t be involved in the trouble. They’ll maybe throw a cone or a bottle or something equally brave This is one of the big problems for me, as like the incident on the train the other day, the idea of the “football lad” allows those who aren’t out and out nutcases to become idiots for a day. If individually they were walking in a busy town centre to work on a Thursday they wouldn’t dream of launching a bottle of lager half way up the road, but for that Saturday afternoon, they probably feel that there is almost an unwritten rule that allows them to do it. Again, individually, I don’t think any of those lads would harass people on a train (I don’t know them, and there could be one or two real arse holes amongst them) but under the banner of football, lad, Villa, match day, lager, firm they feel like they are untouchable. As has been mentioned, it’s the safety in numbers feeling that drives a lot of the bad behaviour. For example, if you ran on the Villa Park pitch on your own, you’d be banned from Villa Park and given a £1000 fine. If you and 500 others run on the pitch, nothing happens to you. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dAVe80 Posted April 28, 2017 Share Posted April 28, 2017 3 minutes ago, turvontour said: For example, if you ran on the Villa Park pitch on your own, you’d be banned from Villa Park and given a £1000 fine. Now this is the thing I don't understand. Why the hell would you run on the pitch, during a game on your own? The two or three lads that did it on Sunday, will have got a massive fine, and a ban, for what? To look like an absolute tit, in front of 40k people? You don't even get on the TV anymore, they turn the cameras away from the pitch.. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kurtsimonw Posted April 28, 2017 Share Posted April 28, 2017 (edited) It's pretty unavoidable. Alcohol is a problem, one I've never really understood the obsession with, but it's never going away. Even then, it's far from being the sole contributing factor. As mentioned above, people are the main problem. It's not isolated to football. You have people fight over politics, religion and so on too. Edited April 28, 2017 by kurtsimonw Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bobzy Posted April 28, 2017 Author Share Posted April 28, 2017 1 hour ago, blandy said: That part is not not right at all. It's very very wrong. Boxing, Rugby League, Cricket, Baseball... google almost any sport + crowd trouble and you get to see the picture. And it's not a uniquely English or British problem, e.g Baseball - http://www.cbssports.com/general/news/serious-fan-violence-taking-on-life-of-its-own-can-it-be-stopped/ Football gets most of the media focus due to it's dominating popularity in this country. The problem is basically human beings. I probably should have referred back to my original post - I think I mentioned something about "in the UK". I think the class point is partly true - as brought up by jack villa_shere up there - not to say that all working class people are yobs (that would obviously be completely untrue) - and also having a group mentality. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
blandy Posted April 28, 2017 Moderator Share Posted April 28, 2017 1 hour ago, bobzy said: I probably should have referred back to my original post - I think I mentioned something about "in the UK". I think the class point is partly true - as brought up by jack villa_shere up there - not to say that all working class people are yobs (that would obviously be completely untrue) - and also having a group mentality. My comment still stands, I think - there is unfortunately significant crowd problems at other sporting events than football in the UK. Boxing and Rugby League in recent memory - worse than anything at football in the same time frame. https://www.thesun.co.uk/news/2902320/brawl-elland-road-punch-up/ - links to a video of fighting breaking out during a boxing, er, fight. Quote CHAIRS were hurled through the air and a woman was even knocked out in a mass, violent brawl after a boxing match in Leeds last night. The chaos unfolded at Leeds United’s Elland Road ground on Saturday night when dozens of spectators turned on each other at a boxing event, hurling insults and objects across the stadium’s Centenary Pavilion.... 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
turvontour Posted April 28, 2017 Share Posted April 28, 2017 49 minutes ago, dAVe80 said: Now this is the thing I don't understand. Why the hell would you run on the pitch, during a game on your own? The two or three lads that did it on Sunday, will have got a massive fine, and a ban, for what? To look like an absolute tit, in front of 40k people? You don't even get on the TV anymore, they turn the cameras away from the pitch.. Why would anyone commit any crime? What I’ll always come back to in this sort of discussion is the sheer volume of people that we’re dealing with at Villa Park. Among that 40,000 crowd, you know that there are a minimum of 400-500 absolute bell ends. The bell end takes various forms too, from the lad graffiting in the toilet, to the pitch invader, from the guy punching the Blues fan, to the little scroat throwing a brick at the Blues fans coach window. I tried to illustrate it in the other thread by suggesting how many of our fans on average have criminal records. If you know that there’s 200 people at a Villa match with a serious criminal record, why wouldn’t they commit crime at the game? Remember that guy that turned up to the Albion FA cup game the other year with a dildo stuck on the top of his head. You can’t legislate for these characters and its why I was saying that you shouldn’t feel any shame for their actions as a Villa fan. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dAVe80 Posted April 28, 2017 Share Posted April 28, 2017 57 minutes ago, turvontour said: Why would anyone commit any crime? What I’ll always come back to in this sort of discussion is the sheer volume of people that we’re dealing with at Villa Park. Among that 40,000 crowd, you know that there are a minimum of 400-500 absolute bell ends. The bell end takes various forms too, from the lad graffiting in the toilet, to the pitch invader, from the guy punching the Blues fan, to the little scroat throwing a brick at the Blues fans coach window. I tried to illustrate it in the other thread by suggesting how many of our fans on average have criminal records. If you know that there’s 200 people at a Villa match with a serious criminal record, why wouldn’t they commit crime at the game? Remember that guy that turned up to the Albion FA cup game the other year with a dildo stuck on the top of his head. You can’t legislate for these characters and its why I was saying that you shouldn’t feel any shame for their actions as a Villa fan. Oh yeah, I agree. I just wonder what they think is going to happen when they run on the pitch. I can kind of forgive it, if a lot of people spill on to the pitch after a goal is scored. I get the fact people get caught up in the emotion of it. Sometimes it's just through shear force that you end up the pitch, after a surge forward from the crowd. What I don't get is the mentality of someone who just decided to run on the pitch on their own. I assume they've paid for their ticket, and it'll not be a small amount of money either, so why do something that you know is not only going to get you chucked out of that game, but also banned from attending future games? It's just idiotic. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
turvontour Posted April 28, 2017 Share Posted April 28, 2017 35 minutes ago, dAVe80 said: Oh yeah, I agree. I just wonder what they think is going to happen when they run on the pitch. I can kind of forgive it, if a lot of people spill on to the pitch after a goal is scored. I get the fact people get caught up in the emotion of it. Sometimes it's just through shear force that you end up the pitch, after a surge forward from the crowd. What I don't get is the mentality of someone who just decided to run on the pitch on their own. I assume they've paid for their ticket, and it'll not be a small amount of money either, so why do something that you know is not only going to get you chucked out of that game, but also banned from attending future games? It's just idiotic. As with a lot of these examples, its likely to just be an attention seeking thing. Look at me, I’m the centre of 40,000 people’s attention, plus the endless videos from every angle of me being tripped over by the steward, plus people like you and I taking time to rationalise it. To some, that notoriety may well be worth the cost of the fine and ban. A football banning order might be seen as cool in certain circles, as I believe Asbos also were among young chavs for a while? In other words, they had the opposite impact to which they were intended, as individuals deliberately committed crime in order to receive the “punishment”. To answer your question directly, they know full well what will happen when they encroach on the pitch. Again, it’s difficult for me in my own mind to see past the simple notion of people just wanting to break the rules. The pitch is seen as sacred, with its stewards and police lining the perimeter. Some people simply just want to do what they’re supposed not to do. What actually pushes people to do it will be a combination of drink, drugs (maybe), peer pressure, unbridled jubilation (which I don’t believe btw as you can celebrate as much as you want around your allocated seat), intrigue (joke) etc. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ingram85 Posted April 28, 2017 Share Posted April 28, 2017 Stop using larger text than us detritus. You aren't better than us Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ponky Posted April 28, 2017 Share Posted April 28, 2017 You get the odd isolated little bit of biff but by and large such violence is unheard of in crowds for Aussie Rules and Rugby codes here in Oz. One of the greatest things in footy in my view is being able to go to a game and sit with mates or family members who support opposing teams and have a bit of banter with each other and those around you without having a punch on. There are always drunk morons who want to take it too far but most people seem able to control themselves. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
HanoiVillan Posted April 28, 2017 Share Posted April 28, 2017 3 hours ago, turvontour said: Remember that guy that turned up to the Albion FA cup game the other year with a dildo stuck on the top of his head. You can’t legislate for these characters Woah woah woah, criticise hooligans all you like but this is too far. That guy was excellent. 3 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts