...
Upon returning to the town square from the match, tales of violent skirmishes involving Celtic fans, the Dutch police and undercover policemen were all the rage among some dazed visitors.
Most visiting fans looked like they would have had trouble attempting to make sense of the city's infamous Red Light district, but there was apparently enough life in them to take on the cops.
As Aston Villa manager and former Celtic captain Paul Lambert pointed out on Thursday, it is difficult to swallow the belief that travelling fans were the main culprits of such goings on.
"I played for many years at Celtic and I never encountered any bother," said Lambert. "I played in the UEFA Cup final and we took over maybe 80-90,000 to Seville and there was not one arrest while we were there. Knowing the club and the fans the way I do, I find it incredible. I'm not sure they would have started anything."
A more believable tale comes from an eye witness who claimed hooded Ajax casuals emerging from the shadows were guilty of prompting the trouble.
The club's statement about a "high degree of provocation" is watertight.
When the drink is in the wit is out. It does not take much to set off a chaotic sequence of events by tossing a few bottles like petrol on a bonfire, especially when it seems to have been pre-planned by Dutch hooligans, but there is something deeply sinister about how local police handled the visiting fans.
Why was there a need for undercover police to mingle among the travelling fans? How many of those involved in the trouble had leanings towards Ajax? How many had a penchant for unnecessary violence?
These are all issues that have to be addressed as much as the police victims left strewn across the city centre amid the carnage. Judge for yourself on the video. Police training in the art of appropriate force is tossed to the wind like the flying debris that apparently made its way into the saturated surroundings.
From this vantage point of a good day out turned rotten, I would suggest some of those Dutch police were not acting in self-defence, but were grown men looking for trouble behind a badge. In my opinion, grown men looking to inflict damage with needless acts of violence. A pub frequented by Celtic fans publicly apologised to the visitors for the treatment doled out to them.
Can you imagine the outrage there would be in this country if a policeman began laying into a football fan with such an assault? Can you imagine the furore there would be if a British officer encouraged a dog to take a chunk of a fan's knee while his colleague held him? It seems to me that police brutality has never been so obvious.
Ajax casuals had also invaded a bar the night before the match to make off with a Celtic flag. It is fair to say Ajax boast an element of supporters whose behaviour is at odds with the tranquil surroundings of their city.
Their supporters are facing punishment from UEFA for their conduct in Glasgow a fortnight ago, and their brandishing of an offensive banner on Wednesday. Celtic have turned up at various places on the continent in recent times with little trouble including cities such as Milan, Barcelona and Lisbon.
This onlooker is not for one minute suggesting Celtic fans are whiter than white. No club can take 13,000 with them to the Netherlands, and expect everybody to behave themselves.
One aggressive sort had a go at me for donning an orange top, suggesting the lowest common denominator can still board a plane; but the vast majority of the Glasgow club's followers travel well around Europe. Ask the mayor of Seville about Celtic's fans.
That Celtic's supporters should run into such chaotic scenes in the Netherlands says more about Ajax fans and the incompetence of the Amsterdam Police than it does Celtic's travelling support.
"This happens all the time with Ajax," an apologetic Dutch fan told me the other night.
He was right. Manchester United fans were confronted by Ajax casuals during their Europa League match in Amsterdam last February, while around 25 Manchester City followers were picked up by police after battling with Ajax fans last October.
On the plane home yesterday, a ravaged Celtic follower made one telling statement that suggested Ajax's fans had sickened him off the joint, if not the joint. "I would never go back to Amsterdam to watch Celtic," he said.
Sad but wise. Amsterdam is a football city, but one that is better visiting when there is no football on.
Quote
Originally Posted by OwlsFan
Bookmarks