Thursday Night Is Failure Night: Europa League 2017/18

[Walt Flanagans Dog]

I know it's my own fault but I ended up on the Daily Express blog from last night's game and here's a few gems before I go and wash my eyes out with bleach:

20:07: Blimey. Having begun to let some Cologne supporters into the stadium, fights are now breaking out.

20:10: Riot police have arrived!

20:20: Cologne can’t say they weren’t warned!

TWITTER ROUND-UP

Gareth: I'm sure a few phone calls to Millwall and this Arsenal situation could've been sorted hours ago!

Cheney: What's the point in travelling all the way to another country and ruining the game/ evening for everyone?

20:30 Fighting has also taken place around Drayton Park tube. As a result, Arsenal have opted to put the kick off time back by one hour in the interests of crowd safety.

TWITTER ROUND-UP

Connor: Cologne fans have bought Arsenal membership, tickets for the home end and now Arsenal shirts to get in.

21:00: Do Cologne have any recognisable talent? In short, no

1: It’s been complete mayhem folks, but we’re underway at the Emirates. God knows what’s going to happen if Cologne score first!

7: Oh, the flares are out. I would normally tell you if they were set off in the Arsenal or away end, but who knows which is which anymore. Just stick that on the UEFA charges tab...

50: Arsene Wenger’s a genius, obviously. Arsenal are back in the match thanks to substitute Sead Kolasinac! Theo Walcott’s deflected cross loops backwards to the left-back, who unleashes a thunderous volley that almost broke the net. Overheard in the office: “That would have killed a small child…”

86: It’s all gone quiet at the Emirates. Almost no atmosphere can be heard from these thousands of Cologne fans, who had the stuffing knocked out of them by Bellerin’s third

88: Commentators curse. The Cologne fans have started a rendition of a German song and they’re all holding their scarfs aloft. I must have riled them. You’re welcome.

23:15: Talk about overstaying your welcome. Apparently the Cologne supporters are still in the stands signing their hearts out, despite being asked by the stadium announcer to leave.

[Satchmo Distel]

Wingco is doing the Mail reports?

[Nefertiti2]

I went to a concert at The Garage opposite Highbury and Islington station last night and there was a noticeable number of Cologne fans around but I wouldn't say that there and the top end of Upper St was busier than on a standard game night. Afterwards was apparently a bit more chaotic, but travelling back on the Overground from Canonbury at 11.30ish hardly anyone got on at H&I (to the point where I did wonder whether the station had been closed).

After the show we couldn't get into the Hen & Chickens (well known comedy pub) without showing Arsenal tickets, which was inconvenient.

Don't know what time the concert was but Highbury Corner was closed with very loud and drunk -though mostly good humoured Köln Fans chanting and letting off flares and minor vandalism from lunchtime. One of the bridges to the stadium was closed and Köln fans were knocking over fences and barriers that stopped them going where they wanted in the stadium. Could easily have been a lot more arrested - probably handled pretty well all round. A public viewing on Finsbury Parl or Highbury fields might have been a good idea.

[Walt Flanagans Dog]

A common thread in the reporting of this in the English media, and echoed on Twitter comments and so on was that Köln fans came to disrupt the game, getting in the way of Arsenal fans and deliberately causing chaos - and that Arsenal fans weren't safe in the home end from inevitable attack. Robert Peston is quoted somewhere saying he saw them doing Nazi salutes before the game, which seems far fetched - he should perhaps go and bother someone else, for example finding another bank he can trigger a run on.

Edit - he tweeted "These Cologne fans are a disgrace. Nazi salutes. Peeing in doorsteps. My European solidarity is being tested."

[Nocturnal Submission]

Buying tickets for the home stands of Continental grounds on the black market is something I did a fair bit of in the '90s so it would be a bit hypocritical of me to get too upset about what happened last night, though I can understand that Arsenal fans who had taken their kids to the game might have felt rather uneasy, as I probably have done in their place.

[Aitch]

From the WSC Weekly Howl:

There has been some outrage in the media that around 20,000 Cologne fans turned up to watch their team in the Europa League at the Emirates, and that many ended up in seats not taken by Arsenal season ticket holders. Imagine that – a large number of partisan fans actively interested in a competition their team are playing in. Dark days for football.

[Benjm]

Don't know what time the concert was but Highbury Corner was closed with very loud and drunk -though mostly good humoured Köln Fans chanting and letting off flares and minor vandalism from lunchtime. One of the bridges to the stadium was closed and Köln fans were knocking over fences and barriers that stopped them going where they wanted in the stadium. Could easily have been a lot more arrested - probably handled pretty well all round. A public viewing on Finsbury Parl or Highbury fields might have been a good idea.

We got there about 6.30, so presumably after the main group had moved off. I mentioned it to suggest that some of the more lurid 'city under siege' stuff is, as usual, rather misleading. For example, the BBC News site currently has a headline, 'FC Cologne Fans Flood London'.

[Third rate Leszno]

For example, the BBC News site currently has a headline, 'FC Cologne Fans Flood London'.

That'll be the peeing in doorways.

[George C.]

A common thread in the reporting of this in the English media, and echoed on Twitter comments and so on was that Köln fans came to disrupt the game, getting in the way of Arsenal fans and deliberately causing chaos - and that Arsenal fans weren't safe in the home end from inevitable attack. Robert Peston is quoted somewhere saying he saw them doing Nazi salutes before the game, which seems far fetched - he should perhaps go and bother someone else, for example finding another bank he can trigger a run on.

Edit - he tweeted "These Cologne fans are a disgrace. Nazi salutes. Peeing in doorsteps. My European solidarity is being tested."

Peston is talking Pure horseshit.

[G-Man]

FC Köln have released an excellent statement about last night's events.

1. The many thousands of fans who came to London have represented club, city and German football positively, as Londoners and even police have confirmed.

2. “Because of the great demand for tickets, it would have been preferable, not least for reasons of security, had the away fans been allocated more tickets than the obligatory minimum of 5% of capacity, because t was to be expected that thousands of Köln fans would otherwise try to obtain tickets by all other means.” The statement notes that Arsenal fans had given their tickets and season tickets to Köln fans, some for free (!) and others at horrendous prices.

The statement notes that both clubs had urged fans to buy tickets through official channels. Then a dig at Arsenal: “Despite the enormous experience which London’s security forces and Arsenal have…they unfortunately were insufficiently prepared for the situation. From our perspective, the security planning and communication seemed inadequate.” Boom, that sits like the Cordoba goal.

3. “The most important mutual objective to let the match take place that evening was realised by letting all fans with valid tickets swiftly into the stadium. This has been proven to be the right decision. In the end, the mix of home and away fans posed no security risk.” Köln will examine the events intensively with Arsenal, UEFA, security people to prevent similar situations in future.

4. FC Köln distances itself from those who without cause “threatened, insulted or even physically attacked” police and stewards. These people have “cast a shadow” over a game that was special to a whole region and over the courageous performance of the team. “They have done great harm to 1. FC Köln. Although the club bears no culpability in the actions by these troublemakers, we nevertheless ask our English hosts for their pardon.”

[G-Man]

[Kowalski]

Some German fans can to watch Bangor tonight. They said they were Koln fans and laughed heartily before buying two away shirts.

Needless to say the match was abandoned due to floodlight failure when Bangor were 1-0 up.

[Ray de Galles]

My office is between Kings Cross and Islington and there were still quite a few Koln fans hanging around the area today (it was swamped with them from early yesterday).

When do they play next? I was just wondering if any of them were hanging around for a game in London tomorrow when the Leeds team coach drove past me on the Kings Cross Road and I realised they play Millwall tomorrow - could be interesting if the Koln fans turned up there!

[ursus arctos]

They are away to Dortmund at 18:00 on Sunday evening, so there's a chance.

[Kowalski]

Henry Winter has his say;

Don’t try to excuse Cologne yobs

Football escaped calamity at the Emirates. Those of us caught up in the tightening bottleneck outside the Clock End shortly after 7.30pm on Thursday can attest to that. Football could have been facing a far more serious outcome than five arrests and a few bruised stewards.

It was not simply the malevolence of a minority of Cologne fans that risked inflicting chaos and damage, it was also the presence of the selfish, ticketless majority of visiting supporters and those who acquired passes to home areas that caused deepening congestion on one concourse that could have led to physical injury as well as distress.

Cologne deserve punishment from Uefa for their followers putting innocent people in harm’s way. That’s not “generating an atmosphere”, as their apologists would have it, that’s just reckless disregard for others. At least their club had the good grace to apologise last night.

They realised, belatedly, that their fans had threatened safety at the stadium. Those climbing the stairs from outside the Armoury shop, and wanting to turn right along the West Stand towards the Clock End, soon found the concourse increasingly crowded. I turned back because gaps in the crowd were disappearing. Families wisely held back, seeing this human wall forming.

Football got away with it because this was the Emirates, a largely well-organised venue, and because this was Arsenal, whose support was commendably passive in the face of an invasion, not all of which was just boisterous, as depicted in certain quarters. Some of the Cologne fans acted with “yobbish abandon”, representing a “dangerous throwback”, in the withering verdict of Lois Langton, a lawyer and chairwoman of the Arsenal Independent Supporters’ Association.


Heaven knows, the Emirates could do with enhanced atmosphere, and Cologne fans certainly did that with their singing during the game, but not with their pre-match conduct.

“Because of 50 people everything is made bad,” Lukas Podolski tweeted. “Laughable!”

Arsenal fans may recall Podolski’s accuracy was not always faultless at the Emirates during his three seasons there, and his aim certainly failed him when discussing fans of his home-town club. “Cologne shouldn’t need to hide or be ashamed [as] that was a really great atmosphere,” he said.

Come on, Lukas. Cologne should actually be ashamed that some Arsenal supporters turned away and went home, alarmed by the scenes, that (a few) home fans and stewards were attacked, and that fans of the Bundesliga club were all over the ground. Such activity might have provoked a more forceful response elsewhere.

“I do think it is fortunate that Arsenal supporters generally have a good reputation because many other grounds would not have embraced the Cologne supporters in the same way,” Langton said. “Blaming the police and Arsenal masks the fact that large numbers of Cologne supporters behaved in an irresponsible and unacceptable way.

“The suggestion that Arsenal should have provided a larger allocation is not the solution otherwise the next time a club wants more tickets, the supporters will just need to threaten to come anyway as a means of securing the allocation they want.”

Another club, another ground? Football could have been facing a more nightmarish scenario and that is why those who played down the situation, even glamourising visiting fans as true keepers of terrace traditions, should have paused for a moment of reflection, assessing all the complexities and ramifications, before wading in.

So here were the romantics revelling in the generating of a lively atmosphere, that rarity at the Emirates. So there were the allies of the visitors arguing that Cologne fans should be afforded some leeway for emotional eruptions because they had waited 25 years for this moment to be back in Europe, and that there was a culture in parts of the Bundesliga of away fans sitting in home areas.

Those defending the Germans made comparisons to English teams abroad, rather ignoring the differences between club sides and the national team with their significant, and ineradicable cohort of nihilists. If English fans had behaved as Cologne’s did, rushing a stadium, engaging in (a few) fights, intimidating children through their numbers if not their intent, then the condemnation flowing from the Bundesliga romantics and apologists would, rightly, have been robust.

English fans have forsaken much sympathy on the Continent because of past misdemeanours, and the guarda civil and carabinieri have long memories as well as batons, yet that should not allow visitors’ indiscretions to be overlooked. As a club, Cologne clearly did not do enough to deter fans from travelling. They must have known that segregation was being compromised.

Those craving footballing nirvana want rival supporters sitting peacefully alongside each other, as occurs in rugby union, but those who deal in reality know that tribalism still rules, that home and away rarely mix well in the same row. Rivalry can be good-humoured outside but that disappears when the whistle blows. Too much emotion, too much at stake, and, frequently, too much history. Arsenal certainly cannot escape blame. They were hit with one minor charge, “stairways blocked in away supporter sector”, but Uefa missed the real issue here, namely how did so many tickets belonging to Arsenal fans end up in the hands of visitors.

“Many tickets were sold through touts and this is very disappointing,” Arsenal said. But this is not surprising. Probably only Fulham Broadway, the Tube station closest to Stamford Bridge, rivals Holloway Road near the Emirates as the most populated and productive patch for touts. Police frequently turn a blind eye, partly because they have more serious issues to worry about in this security-conscious age. But the work of touts, as Thursday proved, can threaten safety.

The internal review that Arsenal have to conduct must focus on how touts got tickets and examine the issue of people with multiple membership who bought tickets and sold them. It is hard to believe that touts alone were responsible for 7,000-plus Germans gaining entry. Arsenal have some explaining to do. Cologne, at least, have started to apologise.

[Kowalski]

Andy Mitten has written something too.

The truth about FC Cologne supporters, by a football fan who was there

If you saw the news about Arsenal's Europa League game last night, you would think FC Cologne fans were a bunch of mindless neo-Nazi thugs. The truth was very different, says a football fan who went to the game...

I turned away from the art deco splendour of Highbury’s old main stand, its red and white façade and marble halls retained and encasing expensive apartments, then walked down Avenell Road, Aubert Park and onto Drayton Park.

Wow! The street was full of German men in ill-fitting jeans and trainers, which really should have been better given they hailed from the country of Adidas and Puma. This vast assemblage of men resembling extras from the old TV show Auf Wiedersehen, Pet were beery and friendly as they filled the Park Café, Drayton Park pub and the Highbury Library, a café whose name is steeped in irony given the old stadium’s reputation for not being the loudest football ground.

It started to rain and I took shelter under an apartment block. Hundreds did the same. A Köln fan offered me a beer. Two other Germans explained that they were Borussia Dortmund fans (the clubs get on well) and they’d been at Wembley the previous night, where Tottenham actually won in their temporary home. Most didn't have tickets.

I spoke to several. They said similar – that they’d waited 25 years for European football, that London was easy to get to, that they’d received a measly 2,900 allocation, but that around 10,000 had obtained tickets elsewhere. They’d bought them from Arsenal fans, from German friends in London. Thousands of them wanted to see their team and make the trip.

“You were invited to have a party in our country when we staged the World Cup in 2006 and came without tickets to our fan parks,” said Florian from Cologne. “We’re bringing the party to London.”

They weren’t like the drunken rabble of Glasgow Rangers fans who descended on Manchester for the 2008 UEFA Cup final, but in control and pleasant to be around. Eighty minutes before kick-off I walked onto the main bridge to enter the stadium. It was full of travelling fans who’d been stopped by police from going any further. The mood was orderly, good-natured.

I tried to move through the crowd.

“Sorry, sir,” said a fan in English. “We have to stop here. We have been told to wait.” He could not have been more polite. I walked back around the stadium to approach it from Hornsey Road, where I spotted the first Arsenal fans, a small gaggle standing near a young lad selling The Gooner fanzine. Köln fans were everywhere. I saw no trouble, no aggression, no animosity. These weren’t Roman ultras bent on violence, but the huge numbers did cause congestion. Then a small group, perhaps 50, tried to rush the turnstiles; aggressive little arseholes who pulled their hoods down to conceal their identity. Every team has their idiots. I once watched my brother play at Barrow away in front of 585 on a Tuesday night and was asked if his team had brought a firm. They’d “brought” 28 elderly anoraks.

Inside the stadium, Köln fans who’d bought tickets in the home end tried to get in the away end by climbing over a small waist-height barrier. Stewards tried to prevent them. Police were called and order was restored. It was the only trouble I saw all night. There were five arrests from an estimated 20,000 travelling fans.

I watch football around the world as part of my job, following derbies and mixing with fans. It was not what you’d normally see at the Emirates and it should never be condoned, but it was a small flare up which was well managed by police and stewards.

It became clear that there were thousands of Germans in home sections of England’s second biggest club stadium, most of them around their allocated away end.

FC Köln were getting 50,000 average crowds when they were in Germany’s second tier. They’re a huge, big city club. Perhaps because they’ve not sold their soul to become Champions League regulars, their enormous match-going following remains undiminished and I journeyed to Cologne to write about them three years ago.

“Around 98 per cent of the fans at FC Koln matches are from Koln,” explained Vincent Leggett, who has lived in Germany’s fourth biggest city since 1990. “It’s an extension of the community. The players feel like they’re letting them down if they don’t play well.”

“We feel a very strong connection with the crowd,” explained Spaniard Roman Golobart, who appreciated playing in front of 50,000 for second division Koln after moving from Wigan Athletic. “That’s at least ten times the crowd you’d get in the Spanish second division. We’re the 13th best-supported team in Europe and we’re in the second division. We took 10,000 fans to Bochum. We applaud the fans, we see them at training. We think they’re crazy at times, but it’s a wonderful atmosphere in which to play football.”

The Emirates isn’t. Arsenal are a great club with thousands of switched on fans who cringe at the assorted cast of clowns on Arsenal Fans TV. But no Arsenal fan pretends their home is a cauldron of excitement. It frustrates many as much as it does Arsene Wenger, but Arsenal are not alone. All-seater stadia and rising ticket prices made top-flight football less accessible to those who’d once supported it. Every big English ground has seen the atmosphere flatten.

It was anything but when the game started. The noise was immense; the Koln fans even stirred home fans from their slumber. The only aggression I saw was from an Arsenal fan screaming at a fellow Arsenal fan who did little but moan.

Koln got their wonder goal to take the lead and you could hear the noise back over the Rhine. “We pledge to you here our loyalty and honour,” sang an estimated 12,000 of them at the start of the second half. “We stand by you, FC Köln and we walk with you, through fire if it must be, remaining always by your side.”

A small pocket of Arsenal fans tried to hit back with an “Arse-nal” chant. Heavily outnumbered, it was a struggle. Yet there was no trouble.

On the pitch Arsenal surged back and deserved their win. The visiting players saluted their passionate fans. The connection was genuine and more meaningful than the usual identikit platitudes players dole out on social media over here, thanking the fans.

In Koln it’ll be remembered as a great trip. As it should be.

“They were very clever,” said Arsene Wenger when talking about how visiting fans had got tickets. “They got everywhere.” They were and they reminded English football what a great atmosphere is really like.

[tee rex]

Foreign fans take over central London, not yesterday:

[G-Man]

Henry Winter is such a Little Englander cunt.

[Satchmo Distel]

Winter praises Arsenal fans for being "commendably passive." Because that's the mark of a true fan: keep shelling out for the same old shit and never complain. FFS.

[Nefertiti2]

"Commendably passive "in that they didn't get into fights. or do you think they should have violently defended "their "space

[Satchmo Distel]

There are only two options? Nope, I think you can praise non-violence without advocating passivity, unless Winter simply chose the wrong adjective and meant "peaceful".

[Nefertiti2]

There are only two options? Nope, I think you can praise non-violence without advocating passivity, unless Winter simply chose the wrong adjective and meant "peaceful".

In the context it's pretty clear what Winter meant.

Football got away with it because this was the Emirates, a largely well-organised venue, and because this was Arsenal, whose support was commendably passive in the face of an invasion, not all of which was just boisterous, as depicted in certain quarters. Some of the Cologne fans acted with “yobbish abandon”, representing a “dangerous throwback”, in the withering verdict of Lois Langton, a lawyer and chairwoman of the Arsenal Independent Supporters’ Association.

[G-Man]

Winter and Lois Langton are talking shit, what with "invasion" and "yobbish abandon". The notion that Arsenal fans were commendably passive in the face of opposition fans sitting in their midst says more about Arsenal and/or English fans than it does about Köln's fans. In Germany it's normal that fans mix easily in neutral zones.

The problem was not German fans with valid tickets going to a football game, but those fans being told (initially) that their valid tickets had been invalidated. The fuck-up was all Arsenal's, no matter what the Daily Telegraph and the red tops would like to claim.

[Nefertiti2]

Winter and Lois Langton are talking shit, what with "invasion" and "yobbish abandon". The notion that Arsenal fans were commendably passive in the face of opposition fans sitting in their midst says more about Arsenal and/or English fans than it does about Köln's fans. In Germany it's normal that fans mix easily in neutral zones.

The problem was not German fans with valid tickets going to a football game, but those fans being told (initially) that their valid tickets had been invalidated. The fuck-up was all Arsenal's, no matter what the Daily Telegraph and the red tops would like to claim.

you're in South Africa. I'm in Highbury. You don't know what the fuck you're talking about. As FCK have conceded and anyone in the area would have agreed there was actual violence by a small number of Cologne fans. There were also those without tickets seeking entry. It may not have been well handled by the police and the majority of fans may have been good natured, but that doesn't mean that "The fuck up was all Arsenals' whatever you may have read on Koeln Fan sites.
Men drinking strong lager all day and seeking entry into stadium for which they do not have tickets are not the best guarantees of crowd safety. FCK who have a better knowledge of their fan base should have worked with Arsenal the police and Islington Council to set up fanzones/public viewing once they knew the number of fans likely to make the trip .

And you can't blame Arsenal or their fans for the fact that segregation is now compulsory in European games, or for the fact that Koeln fans didn't stick to it. Arsenal club and fans responded remarkably well, all things considered.

[G-Man]

you're in South Africa. I'm in Highbury. You don't know what the fuck you're talking about. As FCK have conceded and anyone in the area would have agreed there was actual violence by a small number of Cologne fans. There were also those without tickets seeking entry. It may not have been well handled by the police and the majority of fans may have been good natured, but that doesn't mean that "The fuck up was all Arsenals' whatever you may have read on Koeln Fan sites.
Men drinking strong lager all day and seeking entry into stadium for which they do not have tickets are not the best guarantees of crowd safety. FCK who have a better knowledge of their fan base should have worked with Arsenal the police and Islington Council to set up fanzones/public viewing once they knew the number of fans likely to make the trip .

And you can't blame Arsenal or their fans for the fact that segregation is now compulsory in European games, or for the fact that Koeln fans didn't stick to it. Arsenal club and fans responded remarkably well, all things considered.

Arsenal and the police were informed of the great numbers of Köln fans travelling but made no plan to deal with it.

What me being in South Africa has to do with anything is beyond me. Maybe you're too close to the action to have a broader perspective. In fact, your convenient ignoring of facts other than those that suit your narrative indicates as much. I don't read FC Köln fansites, but The Guardian reports seem to indicate that the version I subscribe to is closer to the truth than those of the Telegraph and red tops. You are entitled to believe their story and that of the club that is trying to cover up just how much they fucked things up, in terms of planning, security and ticketing.

Incidentally and for general information, 1. FC Köln are never FCK. That's Kaiserslautern.