Mmmmmm.
Personally I got in early as I knew something would kick off. Glad I did: my seat was still spare but my three mates' next to me were taken by bunkers. There were thousands in the ground without tickets.
If anyone really thinks this kind of behaviour is in no way related to what happened in Hillsborough then that beggars belief IMHO.
The fact is that the police last night did what was right to stop another dangerous crush. Which was lock loads of decent ticketed reds out for a game they qualified for. If they'd open the gates only a miracle would have prevented a Hillsborough type crush. You see the authorities have learned how to prevent tragedy: we as a group still don't care. "In's in la".. And in this same group of bunkers will be those that shout loudest about H.J.C. etc.
You know one of the worst things about what the Sun printed? That we as a group have partly used it to absolve ourselves of all blame for what happened at Hillsborough. We haven't had the insight to realise that our own behaviour can set in train a series of events that can create a situation for the police to mismanage. Or rather we seem to have forgotten that. For years after Hillsborough behaviour did seem better but its got worse over the last two seasons, and this season particularly. Perhaps its young lads now who are too young to remember the late 80's but are now old enough to go the game who are chiefly responsible.
I don't give two hoots (O.O.T.S. ?) that I don't have a scouse accent, I have the blood, my family have been on the Kop since the thing was built. All this "they were only robbing wool whoppers". Do run away with your scouse fascism. Thats what it is pure and simple. I've had enough of it. I've know O.O.T. lads who follow this club all over and are great ambassadors for it, not like the crazed numbskull spewing bile in the direction of innocent Greek old men and ladies on the metro on the way to the game. People who when he had got bored were pleasant enough to being showing us all photo's of their "end" at A.E.K. Athens, and wished us all the best for the game.
You know what we have got some whoppers following us, and the worst are with a scouse accent. Licenced to rob, to fight, to bunk, to show frank disregard for anyone but their selves. Licenced to stand there the whole game singing racist and antisemetic songs. Licenced to kick the sh.it out of an 18 y.o.ish Milan fan in our end - although obviously licenced to bunk in their end when they like him are just desperate to watch their team.
You might say "do one if you don't like it", and do you know after over twenty years I feel on the verge of doing just that. So do a lot of other reds, scouse and O.O.T., who I have spoken to in Athens today. It is just a matter of time before there is another tragedy. A sad inevitability.
We can't police ourselves. We can't do a Celtic and take 70,000 to Spain and let those lucky enough to have tickets go watch a game that they have qualified to watch. We can't respect the fact that we are a global club with global fans and as a result we get to play in global events like Champions League Finals. We can't stop making pathetic excuses for the behaviour of idiots based upon the fact their victims speak differently to them.
I'm gutted. Not so much by a defeat instigated by what I believe will prove to be a bent ref - if you will play football matches you have to expect to lose some of them. I'm gutted 'cos I realise that things have gone backward. The abyss of ghosts past await.
But that's alright la, cos ins in, innit?
I know exactly what this fella's talking about as well. Some of the lads we have following us on the away days are absolute tw.ats. I've seen them fighting between themselves at Birmingham, fighting outside Bolton, acting like tw.ats to women and childen in Cardiff even.
