I just can’t understand why someone whose team had just won the Championship of Whatever would celebrate by throwing bottles, turning over and setting cars on fire, and smashing storefront windows.
Your team won.
I can sort of understand the losing fans doing it.
I believe that media coverage is also largely to blame. This isn’t to say that there are no longer cases of violence, but when you only hear about one or two high-profile incidents, divorced from context, you often assume it’s more widespread than it really is.
It’s especially bad in the U.S., where you often only hear reports about football matches when there’s been some kind of hooliganism. During the World Cup, you may not hear any reports about particular matches, but you’ll hear all about the idiot f*ckwads who claim to be supporting England, but who are more interested in fighting than actually attending a football match. The media reports usually don’t try to distinguish the people fighting from the real football fans.
This is exacerbated by the fact that most Americans’ impression of soccer is based on vague memories about the terrace troubles of the 70s and 80s. Most Americans aren’t aware of the efforts that have gone into solving many of these problems, as in changing the terraces to all-seaters.
Living in the States, i wasn’t able to attend any Arsenal matches at Highbury until i lived in London a few years ago. So i never had the opportunity to stand on the terraces. My point is, i never felt like my life was in danger, though i had a great time singing songs and communing with fellow Gooners. Anyone who went there expecting to get in a fight would have been profoundly disappointed.
And before anyone makes wisecracks about the “Highbury Library,” i’ve made the same observations at other stadia, at least in London. The only time i saw anything resembling “crowd trouble” was at an FA Cup match a couple of years ago between QPR and Luton Town; QPR got the winning goal during extra time, scored while a Luton player was lying injured on the pitch. The Luton supporters in the away section were furious, and began throwing stuff on the pitch. However, outside the stadium after the match, the environment was surprisingly calm–the police kept everybody moving and, while i’m sure there may have been a couple of scuffles, i didn’t see any–nothing even approximating riots in the streets.
Living in L.A., the only time there has been any sort of disturbance that was sports-related that was violent was after the Lakers won the championship in 2000.
That happened because of a confluence of events:
For the most part when L.A. teams had won championships, the teams (Dodgers and Lakers) clinched on the road or during the day or both.
The Great Western Forum in Inglewood is not a place that is easy to get to and “hang around”. Dodger Stadium is even harder for that purpose.
So simply because: 1) It was dark out, 2) there was a gathering area for fans, that made it okay for them to riot?*
By the way, while I know that LA does have public transportation, I had the impression that it was vastly underused and a huge money loser for the city, especially the subway system.
It’s virtually impossible for any interfan violence to take place at Celtic-Rangers games because segregation is imposed under an extremely heavy security presence at every level, starting from where supporters’ buses are parked and which on-foot approaches to the ground fans are permitted to take. Inside the ground there is no way for the supporters to meet - at Ibrox (Rangers’ ground) the Celtic fans are put in a section which is inaccessible from any other and at Celtic Park several dozen stewards sit between the home and away support. So there simply isn’t any opportunity for physical trouble, although the fans - both sets - make up for it visually and verbally.
The same segregation takes place at other games involving one (but not both) of Celtic and Rangers, but fewer security personnel are involved and with a couple exceptions (e.g. Celtic-Hearts and Rangers-Aberdeen games) the level of animosity between the two sets of fans wouldn’t be high enough to pose a great threat of trouble.
Payton’s Servant:
The pattern of attacks that have taken place in recent years by Rangers fans on Celtic fans suggests that the violently-inclined Rangers fans are more dangerous when they win - victory seems to just reinforce their “we are the people” mentality. I imagine there’s a similar dynamic at work in the incidents you’re referring to.
Great posts so far, everton - I agree completely with everything you’ve written and my own experiences are in line with your observations.
Correct. I attended a lot of matches at Leeds in the early seventies. Leeds had one of the biggest hooliganism problems. I knew some of the people who took part - they were the thugs and bullies in my home town, and the football match gave them an outlet where they could fight with little fear of getting caught (safety in numbers and anonymous victims).
Absolutely. Up until now, I hadn’t felt the need to interrupt to agree, but in my 6 years living in the US I have been astonished at the willingness of US sports adminstrators to tolerate hooliganism. The worst culprits are, amazingly, college sports. For some reason, it is often regarded boisterous fun for the fans of the winning team to invade the pitch and tear down the goalposts. Commentators will even join in the fun with enthusiastic “they’re about to go” commentaries. Sorry guys - this isn’t fun - it’s hooliganism. I can only recall goalposts being torn down once in the UK (Scottish fans at Wembley - everton probably knows the year), and that was quite correctly viewed as behaviour that must be stopped.
There is little wonder that there has been escalation to the out-of-stadium rioting that followed the Ohio State victory.
On the subject of gangs, I do not agree with the posters who say that the problem is on the decrease. It may no longer be reported as much. For example, The number of homicides involving adult or juvenile gang violence has increased more than six fold since 1976. The increase in gangs and related crime is one of the biggest problems in the affluent county in which I live.
The Scottish bit was a joke–sorry if I offended anyone. 
There was a serious problem for a while at Leeds involving the White Rose fascist organisation who recuited members on the terraces at Elland Road stadium. The fact that the problem is much reduced there these days is almost entirely due to the tireless efforts of decent Leeds fans to stamp it out. Fan power at its best IMHO.
The bad reputation of Scottish fans in England is almost entirely due to that incident (in 1977). Here’s a summary of the changing face of Anglo-Scottish rivalry since the first ever international football match in 1872.
The most shocking aspect of the Cleveland vs Jacksonville incident I mentioned earlier was not so much the violence itself (which was pretty tame compared to the worst incidents at games here), but the fact that Carmen Policy’s first instinct was to absolve his team’s fans from any blame.
FWIW, I just watched the Birmingham vs West Ham United relegation decider in a pub in the East End of London (red hot West Ham territory). There were several colours of shirt on display and some people even cheered for West Ham to lose (presumably fans of other London teams). In the early ’80s there would have been bloodshed, but today there was no trouble at all and handshakes all rounds in spite of the Hammers’ bitter disappointment at losing.
It didn’t make it OK to riot, it was an explanation of why people rioted in 2000 when they didn’t at other opportunities.
The destructive effect of shallow media coverage is often underestimated. Believe it or not there are likely to be some British people who are afraid to visit the USA at all. Yesterday’s news ran the story of Karen Lovell being shot while pointing a gun at her own son’s head, there was extensive coverage of the Washington sniper story last year, several schoolyard shootings have been reported, there have been other stories of British tourists being killed in Florida and elsewhere, and numerous similar stories over the years. The impression created by all this is that people run a severe risk of being shot in the street on a daily basis in America. But if that was really a true picture then US society wouldn’t be able to function at all. No doubt there are too many murders and some irresponsible use of guns, but it should be seen it its proper perspective.
In the same way, if the American public only hear stories about crowd trouble at football matches its no wonder they get a distorted impression of the risks involved.
It’s good to have a thread like this where the problems can be discussed rationally and where a true contrast can be seen between the isolated cases of unacceptable behaviour and the normal experience of watching sport in safety.