11/25/2004|||110140040248298836||||||

CROWD CONTROL

The Daily Telegraph (reg required) reports that an English football fan who racially abused striker Dwight Yorke is banned from every soccer stadium in the country for the next five years. Meanwhile, the same paper has news that Spanish fans have been up to their old tricks again:

"UEFA will study television evidence and "other information" before deciding whether to take action against Real Madrid for the racist chanting which marred the Champions League tie against Bayer Leverkusen. Sections of the Bernabeu crowd are alleged to have made monkey chants towards Leverkusen's Brazilian defender Roque Junior, while television cameras caught a small group of Madrid supporters making Nazi salutes."

If you think that's depressing, try dipping into Franklin Foer's book How Soccer Explains The World. (A copy of the UK edition - out in January - dropped through my letter-box this morning. ) The opening chapter depicts the thugs who follow the fortunes of Serbia's top team, Red Star Belgrade:

"[A]t Red Star the violent fans occupy a place of honour, and more than that. They meet with club officials to streamline the organizational flow chart of their gangs. Their leaders receive stipends. And as part of this package, they have access to office space in the team's headquarters...

"The gangs have influence, in large measure, because they've won it with intimidation. A few months before I arrived...Red Star fan clubs had burst into the team's training session. With bats, bars and other bludgeons, they beat three of their own players. After their havoc, they aren't typically shy about advertising their accomplishments. In this instance, the hooligans told reporters bluntly that they could 'no longer tolerate lack of commitment on the pitch.' "

|||Clive|||http://clivedavis.blogspot.com/2004/11/crowd-control-daily-telegraph-reg.html|||11/25/2004 04:05:00 pm|||||||||

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