Karren Brady: Upsetting scenes in Indonesia were football’s biggest nightmare revisited – all caused by fools in charge
The choking of at least 125 fans at Kanjuruhan Stadium in East Java last Saturday was the latest horror in football matches across the world.
Liverpool supporters who escaped the frenzied crush at the Stade de France can only be grateful that woefully inadequate policing only twice extended to firing tear gas into the crowd during the League final champions last season.
2
2
It could have been worse. It appears, according to a French minister, that grenades or some form of hand-held rubber ball launcher were considered but would not have been “proportionate”.
In Malang, tear gas was also the tool of the night and the imbeciles responsible provoked a massacre of innocent people.
It was not a clash of rival fans spiraling out of control. Far from it, away fans had been banned, ironically for fear of clashes and only supporters of local club Arema were allowed in.
Sadly Hillsborough 1989 shades. Over 4,000 out of the capacity of 38,000 squeezed into a single area.
Even that could have been controlled, but when fans spilled onto the pitch, police responded with volleys of tear gas, some of them in the stands.
You can only imagine the chaos. People fell, blinded, coughing and vomiting as others ran through them, desperate to escape, dying in the attempt.
It was football’s greatest nightmare revisited.
It reminds us of the importance of good policing, careful planning, sensible procedures, sensitive handling, and a thorough understanding that panic and excitability are the enemies of control. crowds, among the police and the stewards as well as the crowds.
Most read in the Premier League
FREE BETS AND SIGNUP OFFERS – BEST OFFERS FOR NEW CUSTOMERS
I refer to Paris because it was administrative arrogance personified. This is where the scorn of those who helped make football attendance a generally enjoyable entertainment was unleashed.
Police and clubs in England have learned from the horrific incidents since Heysel in 1985 and beyond that we must be diligent and vigilant in crowd control.
Most of the supporters are great. They want an entertaining game, watched safely. But there’s always the odd one out who’s in trouble.
Football clubs have methods of catching disgrace bearers.
At the London Stadium, we have 1,300 stewards, full indoor and outdoor policing, razor-sharp CCTV and an army of fan liaison officers.
Not so long ago, in the 1980s in particular, hooliganism was out of control in this country.
I remember hearing about the Zulus, a gang that claimed to support Birmingham. At St Andrew’s in 1985 (that year again), when hellraisers clashed with an equally sinister Leeds gang, the ground was a battlefield.
The Leeds crowd ducked fencing to battle the Zulus, who tore down billboards and charged like a cinematic battle.
After 30 minutes of open warfare, the police mounted their horses and chased the crowd to the stands.
The crush was such that a wall collapsed on a fan and killed him.
Thank goodness we haven’t seen this repeated in decades.
Indonesian football is still plagued by hooliganism, brutal police and poor crowd management.
The terrible result is all those lives lost, including about 32 children.
Various investigations in Indonesia have been called for and the police – 18 officers so far have been arrested – will bear much of the blame.
There were, according to the Arema coach, supporters “dying in the arms of the players”. Completely tragic.