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25 thoughts on “Supporters Incidents At The Ethiad”

• Crowds surged towards the police and the police pushed people that weren’t even involved, few friends caught up in it all weren’t allowed up their closest stair case and told to make their way through the more aggressive of the crowd.
  When people fell over at the front, police and stewards picked them up by the scruff of their necks and in some cases were just thrown back into the crowd of Chelsea fans to the right of our allocation.
  Police seemed to have all their focus on the away end with not one visible officer facing the home fans, home fans giving it just as bad as anyone and some coins even thrown across the barrier towards the away fans.

  • Thank you for taking time to respond – this backs up some other accounts we have had – we will use this account along with others while we liaise with the clubs

    • Can we get some sort reply from a senior source at GMP, i am still livid by my treatment at the etihad. I’m not blind to the indiscretions of chelsea fans but am sick of going to northern grounds and the police give carte blanche to the home fans to basically do as they please. We all want football to be safer, more pleasant and somewhere we can take our families for a good day out without risk of violence or abuse. For the aforesaid to be condoned by the police, I feel disgusted and let down. Surely all members of society deserve equal treatment by the police, no matter where they’re from, don’t we all pay for that privilege and respect them for their impartiality? Sadly not on my trip to Manchester.

      • Hi Ed – we are in the process of arranging a meeting with both City & the GMP – because of Istanbul it will most probably be the week after next – but it will go ahead & minutes will go up on here

  • I too was shocked by the ‘best of greater manchester constabulary’. I was in the upper tier and from just after kick off was amazed by a section next to us being abusive, giving masturbating signals etc. I went to the segregated area with stewards and police, and asked why the stewards and police were only facing us, the reply from one policeman in particular was, your fans are more abusive than city, if you don’t go back to your seat you’ll be ejected.” The over the top searches outside and treatment by the police inside made me wonder why we, the taxpayer pay their wages. I felt like the police on the day were like a local paramilitary junta for the home fans. I’m sick of watching football under similar conditions and certainly don’t want my sons going. Roll on when we can be treated like germans fans, encouraged, engaged and not criminalised!

• Greater Manchester Police acted disgracefully inside & outside the stadium towards Chelsea fans & were lucky they didn’t incite a riot.
  I was with my son & we were both pushed quite forcibly for no apparent reason on a few occasions inside the ground. When calmly questioning why they were acting in this manner was told to ‘shut it or risk getting arrested’
  Outside, 1 policeman on horseback decided to let his horse walk into many Chelsea fans, again for no apparent reason.
  The police seemed pumped up & were looking for a row no matter what. They need to be held accountable for their actions as I imagine there’s enough CCTV evidence to back up my claims.

  • Thank you for this – backs up quite a lot of what we have heard already. We will certainly add this to the list – we have been in communication with both clubs – but we will now liaise with the police

  • “The” Robert Isaac who once played for Chelsea may I ask ?

    • Yes Jonesy, the one and the same.
      Robert is also on Facebook if you want to request as a friend.
      – Ed

• We arrived about an hour before kick off, the stewards outside were quite friendly but in my opinion, the way we were treated was way over the top.
  The security to get through the turnstiles was worse than the way we get treated in Europe. Having to go through three different security checks seemed a tad excessive!
  It seems the NW and Birmingham grounds seem to be the ones with these issues, never get this sort of treatment at other Premiership grounds.
  Ed.

  • Thanks Ed – It does seem to be getting worse when supporters are more well behaved than ever – as if they are trying to cause issues

    • Yes, perhaps to justify the huge cost of policing at the etihad. On the day, with 60000+ chelsea in attendance stewards would have been more than ample, but those in blue on god knows what rates of overtime decided to ignore or in some cases incite acts contrary to what we want at football grounds these days. Disgusted doesn’t get near what I feel.

  • This was my wife’s and I’s experience exacerbated by the fact that we are both pensioners!!

    We have not been treated so badly since we went to Barcelona!

    There was even a big police presence on the concourse before the match started. We wondered if there was no crime in Manchester to respond to!!

    To see lines of stewards and police facing us along the edge of the pitch was ridiculous. Did they really believe we were going to. Invade the pitch!

    To see further lines of stewards and police facing us between the two sets of fans and not one facing Man City fans was most disturbing and made mockery of their “Celebrating Away Fans” initiative!!

    We even noticed that whilst the City team was announced before the game the Chelsea team wasn’t.

    As for getting away after the match I have not seen so many police lining the road back towards the City Centre.

    All in all it was not a good experience.

    • Thanks John – all added to our report

• I thought the stewards and police were very aggressive with the chelsea fans throughout the game. I was situated right near their home fans and when they scored their first, they were trying to jump over the barriers at us.

  I went to the toilet and missed their second goal but as I tried to get back to my seat I was told by a steward that I had to wait until their fans had finished celebrating. I told him that this was the away end and that I wasn’t waiting for them to finish celebrating. He told me not to move and I kept saying how I had spent a lot of time and money to get here and that this was a joke. He said if I carried on we would call the police and have me kicked out. I had no choice but to wait there for around 5 minutes.

  At the end of the game I was forced up the stairs by police and stewards and nearly fell to the floor. Totally unacceptable behaviour.

• Luckily I was well away from the trouble inside the ground but when I left the ground the atmosphere was toxic – there was lots of aggression yet police were simply riding their horses into groups of Chelsea fans who were doing nothing more than trying to get away from the ground. Then all the police suddenly went – leaving fans to mix freely & that is when small skirmishes broke out all over the place with no one to stop them – there seemed to be no sense to the policing – very badly organised all round

• In my opinion the policing at City was way over the top and I think actually was the catalyst for much of the trouble in the ground – the police waded in to the Chelsea supporters with no consideration for the vast majority who were well behaved to get a couple of idiots. I saw ordinary fans being shoved out the way which in my mind had the potential to cause panic and injuries.

  The police must be held account as their behaviour was unacceptable – we are not all holigans and I do not belive that they should be permitted to justify their actions just to catch a couple of gobby teenagers

• I would be interested to hear what the Greater Manchester Police made of the match – from my vantage point it looked like initially that both sets of supporters were trading insults – but it was when coins came over from the City side that things got a little out of hand. However, rather than try & prevent the coin throwing & so restore calm the police & stewards waded in en masse & only then were punches thrown (from both sides)

  In my opinion had the police/stewards even made a show of stopping the missile throwing then the ugly scenes could have been avoided.

  The police’s conduct outside was no better – they ignored volatile situations and seemed to leave the area very quickly after the final whistle leaving those wishing to make trouble up to their own devices.

  • Thanks Justin – confirms a lot of other reports we have had – we will be meeting with the Greater Manchester Police & we will put this to them

• Stewards provoking chelsea fans from the off, pushing people for no reason in the queue, swearing at fans not letting people in for no reason, city fans trying to get a reaction the whole game man city playing one step beyond was another stupid decision, at the end police where pushing chels fans who weren’t even involved, let city fans do what they want coins thrown at chelsea which was ignored by police when a chelsea fan did the same was instantly nicked and after the game gmp claimed to not know where the station was which is clearly a lie as they had no intent to help chelsea fans all day,

  • Thanks Will – the police look to have been a big part of the problem. We are also in contact with City’s Fans Liaison Officer so we will put your account to them

• Towards the end of the game by the divide between the fans on the bottom tier the police/stewards seemed to almost encourage the fans to provoke each other and seemingly oblivious to the possibility of serious disorder did nothing to restrain the home fans .

  • This was my view too – the amount of coins coming over was unreal

• Hi, not in any way looking for an argument, was just reading a few comments here. I agree with the policing being heavy handed towards you guys and I noticed that, but it seemed like a minority of your supporters turned up looking for trouble, abusive language, singing during the minute silence, being aggressive towards police, stewards and our fans. Like I said it was a minority. I stand right next to the away fans and on the way out of the ground, things were getting heated and the police were forcing us out of the stadium, outside the ground a police lady on horseback charged at a few of us for no reason, which caused retaliation from our supporters. They were bang out of order but if you look at it from their point of view, there was a large number of your fans coming, a minority looking for trouble, the police did not want any trouble so tried their best to prevent it, however they did it the wrong way and caused the trouble, I would like to apologise on behalf of any abusive city fans towards the innocent section of your fans.

  • The problem, though, is that the police’s response to expecting “trouble” is to act heavy-handedly, as if they can scare/beat people into behaving properly.

    In reality, this does the exact opposite – provoking ordinary fans who just wanted to watch the game and cheer on their team, but when pushed around are not going to react well.

    In the long term, it only makes watching football more dangerous. Families & ordinary people will see the trouble at this year’s game and be put off going next year for fear of more. “Trouble” elements will be doubly motivated to go in their place next year, seeing it as a place to have a scrap with the police/stewards/opposition, and with others put off going, there will be more tickets available for those looking to cause trouble.

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