Thuggery at the CBS

[Heathen]

https://www.coventrytelegraph.net/sport/football/football-news/coventry-city-boddy-crowd-trouble-23742287

[Neils]

To be expected.

[DGP Wasp]

To be expected.

Is it?

A bit of a clichéd remark from one of those sanctimonious rugby fans (to adopt another cliché) towards those thuggish football fans.  Football has done a pretty decent job of keeping this kind of behaviour in check in the past 20-30 years since the very grim days of the 1970s and 80s.  For whatever reason, this kind of behaviour does seem to be creeping back in, and clubs appear pretty quick to respond and ban the small minority before it grows any bigger.

This sort of conduct is not "to be expected", it is to be condemned and eradicated ASAP.  I hope CCFC succeed in identifying those responsible and banning them from future games as they have no place in any sport.

No sector of society is without its mindless morons, and I have occasionally had to remind rugby supporters sitting near me how to behave.  I'm not talking about people giving rugby a go for the first time and struggling with previously inconceivable mix of availability of alcohol and lack of supporter segregation; these are Wasps fans, wearing Wasps colours, who should know better, but may have over indulged and over stepped the mark of what most of us consider to be acceptable.  Believe it or not, the overwhelming majority of football fans have similar expectations of acceptable behaviour, and it is not their fault that football will forever attract that mindless minority who see it as a vehicle for their thuggish instincts.  Hackneyed snobbery dismissing it as "to be expected" isn't particularly constructive.

[InBetweenWasp]

I guess it depends on how we define expected, DGP Wasp.  It appears that rather than the behaviour of fans having changed, it's simply policed better with both better preventative measures and efforts of Clubs/local forces to apply retrospective punishment to those involved in such incidents.

A few weeks back I was on a (very tame) Stag Do in Oxford on the day Oxford City were playing Ipswich - Hardly a derby game, nor teams historically associated with hooliganism.  Yet, there was an obvious police presence and doormen at Bars with fans inside at 12:00/13:00ish as we passed through.

Perhaps it's not to be expected with the amount of resource and manpower that goes into making it safe because of the minority of fans.  Equally, perhaps it would be nice not to expect it to have to be so well policed/resourced to keep it safe for the majority of attendees.

[Shugs]

I don’t think the inference in “to be expected” was that it is OK. More that it is inevitable - which, to be honest, it is. Football matches have a hugely different feel to rugby matches, police presence has to be greater, segregation is required and there is massively more anti-social behaviour and sometimes violence. It’s not snobbishness - it’s just a fact.

[Rossm]

There seems to be rise in the use of cocaine which is fuelling the violence. Article in The Guardian (Feb 2022):

https://www.theguardian.com/football/2022/feb/18/the-shocking-rise-of-disorder-at-matches

An extract below:

One transgressive act that was never part of football culture but is highly visible now is the consumption of cocaine. It was a key detail in Louise Casey’s report into events at Wembley, where she argued cocaine use enabled the disorder to continue for many hours longer than it otherwise might have. It has also been the cause of the majority of just under 100 additional arrests the UKFPU reported having made in the season to January. “There’s no doubt that even at smaller clubs the toilets look like a launderette by the end of the game,” one official involved in stadium management says. “There’s powder all over the place.”

[Neils]

There seems to be rise in the use of cocaine which is fuelling the violence. Article in The Guardian (Feb 2022):

https://www.theguardian.com/football/2022/feb/18/the-shocking-rise-of-disorder-at-matches

An extract below:

One transgressive act that was never part of football culture but is highly visible now is the consumption of cocaine. It was a key detail in Louise Casey’s report into events at Wembley, where she argued cocaine use enabled the disorder to continue for many hours longer than it otherwise might have. It has also been the cause of the majority of just under 100 additional arrests the UKFPU reported having made in the season to January. “There’s no doubt that even at smaller clubs the toilets look like a launderette by the end of the game,” one official involved in stadium management says. “There’s powder all over the place.”

Also this - not footy or rugby but -

Sniffer dogs 'to search for COCAINE' for Fury v Whyte bout at Wembley https://mol.im/a/10739511 via https://dailym.ai/android

[InBetweenWasp]

There seems to be rise in the use of cocaine which is fuelling the violence. Article in The Guardian (Feb 2022):

https://www.theguardian.com/football/2022/feb/18/the-shocking-rise-of-disorder-at-matches

I guess this is loosely true.  I know a few habitual Cocaine users and they take it because it allows them to drink more and only use it when they're drinking heavily.  I suspect this is the bigger reason hooligans are using it and also it's rise in habitual use; it's not for bravado, or to reduce fear.  But allow them to drink more throughout the day without collapsing in a pile, or falling asleep in the stands.

Frankly, for most people using recreational drugs, if they weren't mixing it with alcohol there'd probably be less violence rather than more.  It's alcohol that's more of a problem, I think.  Or at least the combination of recreational drugs + alcohol.

[Bloke in North Dorset]

Or are people more prone to violence taking drugs and alcohol to increase their thrill?

[hookender]

Or not having respect?

https://www.walesonline.co.uk/sport/rugby/rugby-news/outraged-rugby-fan-beats-supporter-23758093