Crawley Pitch Invasion

Quoted from MaccasBoots

Oh do one you prat, I was singing and shouting all game the other night and managed to avoid running on the pitch, throwing flares or using racist/abusive language. Might surprise you but it is possible to support your club with all your heart and not be a toss pot at the same time.

Quoted from diehardmariner

Anyway...

I'm so torn on this whole issue.   There's the purist part of me that thinks there's nothing greater than seeing fans stream on the pitch in celebration after knocking out a far bigger side or achieved some notable success.

I'll never forget the joy of being involved in this and then watching it repeatedly via VHS for many years to come as a young fan.

[youtube]Wjz1IAuWgWg[/youtube]

As much as Cockers' beating the offside trap, as much as him just bundling his way through defenders to force the ball into the net, as much as hanging on after Mark Cooper's strike went in, as much as watching in agony as Murray Jones (yes, the one and only) hit the post with a looping header....this is as much of the memory of that promotion campaign.  Sheer and utter joy and adulation.  The invasion is in the final few seconds of that clip, right at the final whistle, but go back a few seconds and you can see fans are up to the touchline all around the pitch.  

The problem, to my eyes and mind anyway, is that it's just become the norm rather than the expectation in the last 20 years.  Pitch invasions at the end of season games that have no real meaning, why?  It's not as simple as that but a pitch invasion should mean something.  

The issues at the back end of last season were a long time coming.  There's this culture of goading players and staff to get a reaction.  Andy Warhol would have been in his element observing on this moronic need for faux adulation by getting a shaky selfie as you're flicking V's behind the back of the Portsmouth physio.   It's probably because I'm old but I just don't get it.

I don't want to see the joy of celebrating success removed.  As I've got older, I'm less inclined to want to run on the pitch but I get it.  I get it completely that it's a release, no doubt adrenaline and maybe even slightly alcohol fueled, to want to celebrate that success.  But when you get tosspots like the guy who headbutted Billy Sharp getting on the pitch, what can you do?  It was fortune that Sharp wasn't more seriously injured.  But for all the condemnation from the football community, you can guarantee there will be some who saw that happen and think it was great, thinking they can do it too.   Where does it stop, at what point someone get seriously hurt or even killed because some absolute cretin gets the opportunity to do so.

Football clubs are powerless.  Unless they employ absolute shitloads of stewards, who have absolutely no real power, or bring in incredibly expensive policing support they've got no chance of keeping fans off the pitch.  If enough fans want to get onto the pitch, they'll do it.  

Society isn't helping, it's ignoring this as a problem wider than football.  Six-months in jail was what was dished out to Billy Sharp's assaulter, he's probably out now.  

Knowing that clubs can't contain wannabe pitch invaders and that there's always a loose cannon in the midst, there's only one way this is going and that's for us to be penned in behind fences again.  The writing is absolutely on the wall.

Society ignoring its responsibility when it comes towards actions at or around football grounds and then a very hard-line response....this sounds familiar doesn't it?

Quoted from aldi_01

Whilst I agree with your first point I can pretty much guarantee that had a bloke head butted someone like that outside a pub on a Saturday night they wouldn’t have received a prison sentence u less they had priors, if they did they’d feel hard done to given the inconsistent sentencing in this country.

And therein lies another issue for me, inconsistency in policing of football. We saw countless examples of that last season. No coincidence that working with fans and clubs seems to be more effective than working in silos.

Articles like the Times/Talksport one don’t help anything and having spoken with friends who police football they tend to agree with us in that they create a hysteria that is unnecessary and actually throw them under the bus as much as fans.

Quoted from jamesgtfc

I have a relative in the police and I spoke to him a couple of months ago, dropping in that I find police cause a lot of the issues at football games themselves. His response was "of course we do, it's boring otherwise."

Quoted from diehardmariner

Anyway...

I'm so torn on this whole issue.   There's the purist part of me that thinks there's nothing greater than seeing fans stream on the pitch in celebration after knocking out a far bigger side or achieved some notable success.

I'll never forget the joy of being involved in this and then watching it repeatedly via VHS for many years to come as a young fan.

[youtube]Wjz1IAuWgWg[/youtube]

As much as Cockers' beating the offside trap, as much as him just bundling his way through defenders to force the ball into the net, as much as hanging on after Mark Cooper's strike went in, as much as watching in agony as Murray Jones (yes, the one and only) hit the post with a looping header....this is as much of the memory of that promotion campaign.  Sheer and utter joy and adulation.  The invasion is in the final few seconds of that clip, right at the final whistle, but go back a few seconds and you can see fans are up to the touchline all around the pitch.  

The problem, to my eyes and mind anyway, is that it's just become the norm rather than the expectation in the last 20 years.  Pitch invasions at the end of season games that have no real meaning, why?  It's not as simple as that but a pitch invasion should mean something.  

The issues at the back end of last season were a long time coming.  There's this culture of goading players and staff to get a reaction.  Andy Warhol would have been in his element observing on this moronic need for faux adulation by getting a shaky selfie as you're flicking V's behind the back of the Portsmouth physio.   It's probably because I'm old but I just don't get it.

I don't want to see the joy of celebrating success removed.  As I've got older, I'm less inclined to want to run on the pitch but I get it.  I get it completely that it's a release, no doubt adrenaline and maybe even slightly alcohol fueled, to want to celebrate that success.  But when you get tosspots like the guy who headbutted Billy Sharp getting on the pitch, what can you do?  It was fortune that Sharp wasn't more seriously injured.  But for all the condemnation from the football community, you can guarantee there will be some who saw that happen and think it was great, thinking they can do it too.   Where does it stop, at what point someone get seriously hurt or even killed because some absolute cretin gets the opportunity to do so.

Football clubs are powerless.  Unless they employ absolute shitloads of stewards, who have absolutely no real power, or bring in incredibly expensive policing support they've got no chance of keeping fans off the pitch.  If enough fans want to get onto the pitch, they'll do it.  

Society isn't helping, it's ignoring this as a problem wider than football.  Six-months in jail was what was dished out to Billy Sharp's assaulter, he's probably out now.  

Knowing that clubs can't contain wannabe pitch invaders and that there's always a loose cannon in the midst, there's only one way this is going and that's for us to be penned in behind fences again.  The writing is absolutely on the wall.

Society ignoring its responsibility when it comes towards actions at or around football grounds and then a very hard-line response....this sounds familiar doesn't it?