--- begin forwarded text Delivered-To: rah@shipwright.com Delivered-To: clips@philodox.com Date: Sat, 17 Jun 2006 09:24:11 -0400 To: Philodox Clips List <clips@philodox.com> From: "R.A. Hettinga" <rah@shipwright.com> Subject: [Clips] How Britain Beat Hooliganism Reply-To: rah@philodox.com Sender: clips-bounces@philodox.com <http://online.wsj.com/article_print/SB115049661838582842.html> The Wall Street Journal How Britain Beat Hooliganism By CHUCK CULPEPPER June 17, 2006; Page P3 A NUMBER OF countries have grappled with soccer-related violence, but one has significantly reduced hooliganism with some unusual steps that would startle most American sports fans. The country is England, and measures range from deciding who can buy tickets to telling fans where they can sit. For matches with entrenched animosity between the teams, some clubs will sell only to people with a ticket-buying history, meaning a tourist or casual fan can't simply buy an available seat. To minimize taunting, fans of visiting teams must enter stadiums through separate doors marked "visitors," and then must sit together. Beyond that, tickets often bear the name of the purchaser, so in case of a problem, police may track down the responsible parties and soccer clubs may suspend privileges. Closed-circuit cameras blanket stadiums and help prosecutors in soccer-violence cases. With soccer venues purged of the rowdy standing room-only terraces of the 1980s, and fans have become "much less anonymous in the stadium," says John Williams of the University of Leicester's Sir Norman Chester Centre for Football Research. "Now we have a very controlled spectator space." Beer drinking, too, is tightly regulated, and is limited to concession areas. Domestic soccer-related arrests plummeted to about 2,725 in the 2004-05 season from some 8,000 a year in the 1980s. More recently, English authorities have tackled problems with their fans at overseas soccer matches. In the run-up to the World Cup, British authorities required some 3,300 known hooligans to turn in their passports to local police, preventing them from traveling to Germany. More than 90% complied, and airport agents have ensnared a smattering of others who tried to leave the country. Additionally, Britain sent 40 police officers to Germany to help prevent outbreaks, and four prosecutors to gather evidence for any potential court cases. It's a big change from the '80s, when most big-city matches in England had some hooligan incident or element. The crisis peaked in May 1985, when 39 Italian and Belgian fans died in Belgium when a wall collapsed after Liverpool fans charged toward the fans of an Italian team, Juventus. That led the European soccer federation to ban Britain's soccer teams from competition for five years. While no one in the British police or government considers the hooliganism problem solved, hooligans have been pushed away from the stadiums. Some 59% of the arrests in the 2004-05 season took place away from stadium grounds, and a police spokesman said the measures have forced some hooligans to use the Internet or cellphones to arrange fights. On the World Cup's first weekend, about 20 hooligans started a fight that left 16 people injured, but it took place at a big-screen viewing of the England-Paraguay match in East London. Bigger incidents occurred in other European countries this past season, particularly Poland, where a riot after a league championship in Warsaw last month led to the arrest of 231 people and the hospitalization of 50 police officers. In March, a 21-year-old fan was stabbed to death in Krakow. At the World Cup earlier this week, ahead of the Germany-Poland match, police arrested 40 Polish fans and found knives on four of them. In Britain, annual fan surveys by Leicester University show that hooliganism now "figures very little into their perception of football," Mr. Williams says. While fan bases remain predominately young and male, research shows steady increases in both elderly and women attendees. Perhaps the most telling statistic: About 30% of all professional soccer matches in England don't have any police on scene at all, according to government's United Kingdom Football Policing Unit. An estimated 60,000 English fans traveled to Nuremberg for the country's second World Cup game, against Trinidad and Tobago. Some 28 people were arrested, but largely for scalping, public drunkenness and trying to hop the stadium fence. -- ----------------- R. A. Hettinga <mailto: rah@ibuc.com> The Internet Bearer Underwriting Corporation <http://www.ibuc.com/> 44 Farquhar Street, Boston, MA 02131 USA "... however it may deserve respect for its usefulness and antiquity, [predicting the end of the world] has not been found agreeable to experience." -- Edward Gibbon, 'Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire' _______________________________________________ Clips mailing list Clips@philodox.com http://www.philodox.com/mailman/listinfo/clips --- end forwarded text -- ----------------- R. A. Hettinga <mailto: rah@ibuc.com> The Internet Bearer Underwriting Corporation <http://www.ibuc.com/> 44 Farquhar Street, Boston, MA 02131 USA "... however it may deserve respect for its usefulness and antiquity, [predicting the end of the world] has not been found agreeable to experience." -- Edward Gibbon, 'Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire'