Smoke bombs flares etc.

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Originally Posted by NeverFeltBetter

Can't clubs refuse admission themselves without resort to the authorities?

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They can, Ive seen Dundalk fans get refused entrance to Tolka and Dalymount before.

The fact is the Gardai caught a lad fighting on the street in a brawl, and let him go without even a warning and into the ground. They could start doing their jobs!

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Originally Posted by DannyInvincible

Was there legal action taken or anything? Who'd be liable for the injuries sustained? The idiot, Rovers and/or the League? I'm not sure on the law relating to their use specifically, but is it potential liability for injury that motivates the League to oppose their use so strongly? Of course, the use of pyrotechnics isn't legal in Ireland, which is, no doubt, another significant motivation. If they're simply being used on one's property, I assume the proprietor can be held liable. What about the League though?

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No idea, to be honest, I never heard any follow-up. Presumably the club and the individual would be responsible - the club would be liable for damages and the individual for criminal and civil charges. Seemingly one of the earlier incidents at Dundalk this year resulting in two people being hit, one requiring hospital treatment. Again, there's no information on what happened after: http://talkofthetown.ie/2014/05/19/d...ares-at-games/

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Originally Posted by Charlie Darwin

Presumably the club and the individual would be responsible - the club would be liable for damages and the individual for criminal and civil charges.

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That's what I was thinking, so if what we assume is correct and the FAI can't or won't be held liable for damages caused by flare use, what motivates them to come down so hard on their use? Do they think their use is bad for public relations maybe? Easy money from fines? Am I correct in thinking smoking cigarettes inside stadiums is illegal in Ireland? Perhaps not - are stadiums deemed to be enclosed workplaces? - but that also has obvious health implications. To the best of my knowledge though, the FAI don't dish out fines when clubs' supporters are caught smoking inside stadiums.

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Originally Posted by DannyInvincible

That's what I was thinking, so if what we assume is correct and the FAI can't or won't be held liable for damages caused by flare use, what motivates them to come down so hard on their use? Do they think their use is bad for public relations maybe? Easy money from fines? Am I correct in thinking smoking cigarettes inside stadiums is illegal in Ireland? Perhaps not - are stadiums deemed to be enclosed workplaces? - but that also has obvious health implications. To the best of my knowledge though, the FAI don't dish out fines when clubs' supporters are caught smoking inside stadiums.

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Smoking is not allowed in Covered Areas, I know its enforced in the Stand in Oriel but not the Shed.
They use to announce no smoking throughout the ground in any covered areas, but now they just state no smoking in the Stand.

Tallaght dont let you smoke, Stewards were asking Dundalk fans to put them out at the Setanta Final and the League game a few weeks back

Yeah, covered stands count under the smoking legislation. It's ignored in the East Stand in Tallaght, assume the away end is a lot more tightly policed, especially when Dundalk hooligans are in town.

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Originally Posted by Charlie Darwin

Yeah, covered stands count under the smoking legislation. It's ignored in the East Stand in Tallaght, assume the away end is a lot more tightly policed, especially when Dundalk hooligans are in town.

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True, we are a nasty bunch when we have a few cigarettes smoked

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Originally Posted by dundalkfc10

They can, Ive seen Dundalk fans get refused entrance to Tolka and Dalymount before.

The fact is the Gardai caught a lad fighting on the street in a brawl, and let him go without even a warning and into the ground. They could start doing their jobs!

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He probably did get a warning.The Guards likely thought that that was all his actions warranted and the best solution was to get him into the match were he could sober up(or if not drunk then to cop on to himself) & then get his bus home without him being a further drain on resources.

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Originally Posted by dundalkfc10

True, we are a nasty bunch when we have a few cigarettes smoked

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Haha, the question remains though, why the FAI concern themselves so specifically with flares (they're given explicit mention in the participation agreement) but not, say, supporters illegally smoking or drinking within grounds... They leave dealing with the latter matters to the clubs concerned.

Maybe because flares have a higher risk of causing an injury directly? That is to say, a can of beer or a cigarette don't have the same instant ability to hurt someone like a lit flare does. Of course, we all know that beer and fags have dangers attached to them in that kind of situation - alcohol especially with the effect it can have on a person - but I understand why the FAI might consider flares a higher priority.

There might also just be a feeling that flares are something the FAI can do a bit about. You can smoke and drink and have a good chance of getting away with it at matches because it might be hard to spot. You can't avoid the possible repercussions of lighting a flare though, the act itself is designed to draw attention.

And yet the background to the official league site is a smoke bomb crowd/ floodlight shot...

Flairs etc to add to atmosphere at game but I agree with Mr A in previous page flairs etc on their own or in a small crowd do very little its fans chants and songs that create the atmosphere at games.

Re the incidents at Drogs vs Dundalk, it was childish of people to break in a graffiti United Park, no decent fan would do this to any club regardless of rivalries.

Its no where near as bad in Ireland as in other countries, but the Gardai have to step up. From what I've seen they seem more interetsted in getting a few whack at some one with the truncheon than arresting and if they are arrested they are out in a few hours. Name taken and one warning given then if they do it again they get a season ban for attending any FAI/LOI games. Bans increased if they continue. Until such measure are in place it will continue.

Watching a program there a few night ago on BBC3 about English hooligans, one of them a Man City fan came over for the Bohs Vs Shams derby with some of the Shams boys he knows and said despite he got a bit of a beating from the Gardai it was one of his best away trips as no arrest

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Originally Posted by Neish

Flairs etc to add to atmosphere at game but I agree with Mr A in previous page flairs etc on their own or in a small crowd do very little its fans chants and songs that create the atmosphere at games.

Re the incidents at Drogs vs Dundalk, it was childish of people to break in a graffiti United Park, no decent fan would do this to any club regardless of rivalries.

Its no where near as bad in Ireland as in other countries, but the Gardai have to step up. From what I've seen they seem more interetsted in getting a few whack at some one with the truncheon than arresting and if they are arrested they are out in a few hours. Name taken and one warning given then if they do it again they get a season ban for attending any FAI/LOI games. Bans increased if they continue. Until such measure are in place it will continue.

Watching a program there a few night ago on BBC3 about English hooligans, one of them a Man City fan came over for the Bohs Vs Shams derby with some of the Shams boys he knows and said despite he got a bit of a beating from the Gardai it was one of his best away trips as no arrest

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Seen that programme myself. What sad sad little *******s the Rovers lads were

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Originally Posted by dundalkfc10

[/B]Seen that programme myself. What sad sad little *******s the Rovers lads were

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Did it show their faces?

Apparently he is big into the BNP/EDL which is a bit strange him having the craic with shamrock rovers fans in Ireland......

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Originally Posted by Neish

Watching a program there a few night ago on BBC3 about English hooligans, one of them a Man City fan came over for the Bohs Vs Shams derby with some of the Shams boys he knows and said despite he got a bit of a beating from the Gardai it was one of his best away trips as no arrest

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Aye, it's always a bonus when you don't get arrested...

Is it on iPlayer, do you know?

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Originally Posted by DannyInvincible

Aye, it's always a bonus when you don't get arrested...

Is it on iPlayer, do you know?

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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wav_Bfhb5Tw

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Originally Posted by bennocelt

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wav_Bfhb5Tw

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In Ireland at around 39m mins, cause im sure you dont want to sit through it all. its a load of ****e the whole thing

Shows faces of a few of them yeh

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Originally Posted by Neish

Watching a program there a few night ago on BBC3 about English hooligans, one of them a Man City fan came over for the Bohs Vs Shams derby with some of the Shams boys he knows and said despite he got a bit of a beating from the Gardai it was one of his best away trips as no arrest

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Never seen any of those bellends at Rovers matches so can only assume they're day trippers who only show up for Bohs away. I do remember the lad in the blue jacket with the hole in his head stumbling in halfway through the match alright, he thought he was mad. Haven't seen him since, unsurprisingly.

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Originally Posted by Charlie Darwin

Never seen any of those bellends at Rovers matches so can only assume they're day trippers who only show up for Bohs away. I do remember the lad in the blue jacket with the hole in his head stumbling in halfway through the match alright, he thought he was mad. Haven't seen him since, unsurprisingly.

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There was a bit where that so called man city fan was kinda giving out that most of his crew went to watch the match leaving him with only 4 lads to face the opposition. Also had a bit saying that he recruited young lads form the lower leagues to come fight with them.Just show how much they actually care about the football clubs

I met a very interesting, obviously-intelligent and well-educated Preston North End-supporting chap at an after-gathering to a night out a few months back; a friend of a friend of a friend. We discussed football, supporter culture, politics and Irish history (he had Irish roots so was plenty knowledgable) amongst other things. He was an avowed and active anti-fascist with communist leanings/Irish republican sympathies and, to my surprise, went on to make an eloquent case for hooliganism. I'm not saying he necessarily convinced me of its merits, but he did try to make a compelling argument - I was certainly engaged - and it was fascinating to hear such a perspective from someone who looked and sounded like the complete anthithesis of what you might expect a northern English hooligan to look and sound like. He gave me his blog's web address where you can have a read of his written defence of hooliganism if interested: http://northernladsclub.wordpress.co...f-hooligansim/

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Originally Posted by DR

For the vast majority of mainstream British society, the football hooligan represents a bogeyman of sorts. Political figures, newspaper columnists and far-left cultist’s join together to paint the English hooligan as a) violent death-throes of a crushed lumpenproletariat, b) un-cultured smears on our over-intellectualised, safe, passive national pastime and c) fascist-in-waiting members of the petty bourgeoisie. These accusations are merely the scape-goating attempts of an out of touch commentariat. Below is a defence of the humble football hooligan.

To understand the motivation behind hooligan activities you must first be able to understand the real point of going to watch a football match. If your concept of attending a football match is limited to tens of thousands of people passively spectating whilst 22 men kick a spherical ball around with varying degrees of technical ability, then you unfortunately are really missing the point. A football match should “the very last bastion of a once male-dominated culture, where boys can grow up and act like men…scream, shout, abuse, swear, even cry (Dougie Brimson ‘A Geezers Guide to Football’)”. At the apex of this tribal sense of camaraderie is the defining act of hooliganism, i.e two bunches of consenting men meeting for a punch-up (now the consensual side of this is incredibly important. I do not agree with ‘ordinary’ fans being attacked and by and large the serious casuals involved in this culture are aware of the respect and constraints involved when hooliganism is done ‘properly’). There are so many reasons to defend this tribal act.

For a start, the act itself has value, if only as a spontaneous expression of emotion. As much as the Jonathon Wilson led broadsheet mafia would like you to believe otherwise, millions of people do not flock to football matches across the globe to stroke their collective chins and marvel at the deployment of tika-taka, false nines and raumdeuters. Emotion is the greatest defining currency with which football clubs can cash in on to continually seduce supporters back to the stadiums. Remove this and even the dull, pseudo-intellectuals will realise the futility of passively watching 22 overpaid individuals kick a piece of leather around. Without the emotion, football is just that, futile. As a pure expression of this raw, tribal emotion, we should not suppress the right of the football fan to have the occasional scrap. The advent of bland, characterless new Soccerdome stadiums with enforced all seating, over policing and Orwellian levels of CCTV (I visited Ajax’s admittedly impressive 52,000 capacity Amsterdam Arena earlier this week and during to stadium tour, and a visit to the Control Centre revealed camera’s that could zoom in on any seat in the stadium with enough zoom and clarity to read a text off your mobile phone) have numbed football supporters in an attempt to create a docile, robotic, consumer-style football fan. In these situations anything which represents the hedonistic surge of emotion must be celebrated and allowed to continue.

Secondly, in the classical liberal tradition, it is well within your rights to do anything which does not infringe upon the rights of others. So long as all the people involved are consensual and aware of the risks of a casual ruck, and no innocents are caught in the crossfire, then who has the right to deem this act barbaric, vicious or otherwise generally unworthy. I am aware people will reel off examples of either innocent bystanders getting caught in the scuffles, and example of hooliganism going too far and leading to serious injuries or death. Of course I do not advocate such happenings, and a return of hooliganism would require what I would like to call controlled hooliganism, where standard supporters are recognised and not affected and there is an honour in terms of fighting with fists, not weapons.

Furthermore, bringing another of my passions into the mix (left-wing politics), hooligan culture can be advocated for its utility in a revolutionary situation. The British left at the moment is a standing joke. Populated almost exclusively by weird, unapproachable academics and socially awkward, self-loathing middle-class kids, the British left lacks the exact class of people that would be useful, and have a genuine stake in a social revolution: the angry youth of the working class. Football firms tend to exclusive draw on these sort of people. Recruiting working class youths on the terraces could give the left a base in working class communities and provide a cadre of (to borrow from the lexicon of Egyptian revolution) shock troops. During the protests that toppled Mubarak, the Ultras of Cairo’s main football club Al Ahly essentially became a security force of the protestors, protecting Tahrir Square and “providing the fuel – the songs and banners, as well as the muscle – that hastened Mubarak’s exit”( http://www.gq-magazine.co.uk/comment...-football-fans). It doesn’t require a great leap of imagination to realise that, young, tough men who are organised and used to fighting and moving in a bloc, would be incredibly useful cadres in any hypothetical revolutionary situation.

Another justification if you will, of a little scuffle every now and then, requires an appreciation of standard establishment politicians views on hooligans. David Cameron called an event in Newcastle where 29 people were arrested as deplorable. Frankly, a society that is sensitive to the point of hysteria to a bit of honest violence, yet allows insidious and much more harmful violence in the form of cuts to welfare. Google ATOS…cuts…welfare and you will be swamped with stories of deaths of disabled and/or vulnerable members of society who were cut off from benefits and were unable to survive on the pittance that was left to them. An establishment that issues death sentence to the most vulnerable of society yet gets all self-righteous over a few punches can **** of and stew in its own hypocrisy. To quote the late, great Brian Clough “there are more hooligans in the House of Commons than at a football match”.

And finally, hooliganism can be justified via its ability to (again hypothetically) reverse the increasing trend of higher ticket prices. Unfortunately, football has become much more fashionable. People who have no business anywhere near football stadiums have increasingly flocked to them. Top end politicians fall over themselves to pretend to like football, appearing on Football Focus, etc in an attempt to latch on to its increasing popularity. This is just plain wrong. Tory politicians, as shown by the Thatcher governments persistent campaign against the victims of the Hillsborough disaster, are not the friends of football fans. They are our enemy. A return of a controlled hooliganism should help drive away not only these lecherous vote-seekers, but also assorted ‘trendy’ spectators, the foreign students, the business executive, Roy Keane’s infamous prawn sandwich brigade. The removal of such individuals patronage would then leave gaping seats in top flight stadia. The next natural step would be the lowering of ticket prices, which would then woo back the ordinary football fans, who, quite rightly, are disgusted at paying over the top ticket prices (the most expensive season ticket in the Premier League last season was £1,955, at The Emirates Stadium). So there you go, the humble hooligan as manipulator of market forces.

That is my tribute to the long demonised, eternally unappreciated and sometimes completely forgotten figure of English football. My defence of the football hooligan.

DR

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Edit: How did we end up talking about hooliganism on a thread about flares and smokebombs, by the way? The two are not necessary partners! :p