Apart from the supporters of both teams, Sunday afternoon’s Premier League match between Crystal Palace and Nottingham Forest would appear to hold little interest. In recent years, both clubs have exceeded normal expectations by finishing higher in the league than before, but Liverpool v Manchester City it ain’t. It’s typical early afternoon Sky Sports fodder before The Main Event, the so called Super Sunday, which this week features the titans of … er … Fulham and Manchester United. Anyway. Why is Crystal Palace against Nottingham Forest such a big deal? It’s all to do with European football.
Due to ownership issues, which you can read about here, Crystal Palace have been relegated from the Europa League for which they qualified last year, to the European Conference League, better known as that Mickey Mouse tournament that no one gives a toss about, swapping places with Nottingham Forest who, Palace believe, were instrumental in Palace’s relegation. The clubs meet on Sunday and Palace are bricking it that their fans might take out their anger on the Forest owner, local lad (local to Piraeus, Greece) Evangelos Marinakis who was influential in assisting UEFA’s decision (ALLEGEDLY). Who knows what is true and, in normal circumstances I’d say who cares, but a game that was considered to be ‘low risk’ by Inspector Knacker is now anything but.
Angry Palace fans are believed to be arriving early at Selhurst Park on Sunday afternoon to protest, focusing on the Nottingham Forest team bus and and the home club are speaking to the Metropolitan Police over beefing up security arrangements. Marinakis already has his own extensive security detail but that too is being expanded. Why on earth is this all necessary? Simples. The extra security is needed, as it is across professional football, to prevent supporters beating the shit out of each other or causing vandalism. In my lifetime, it has always been thus.
What non-football fans find odd is that football fans see nothing odd about a sport in which paying spectators have to be segregated for fear of doing damage to each other or property. Sunday’s protests are being taken very seriously and while the Guardian article does not expressly say there are fears of violence and disorder, what else can it mean? You don’t need extra security if there are a few people just shouting stuff, but let’s be honest: the relevant parties are concerned about the health and safety of individuals and the defence of property. If the team bus gets trashed, there is also an element of danger to the people who are on it. This is big shit.
I was part of this world for more years than I care to remember, the segregated world of professional football, where you can’t even have a pint with someone from a different club, never mind stand anywhere near them. And again we know why. Some fans like to fight at the football, usually fans from other clubs who like to fight, and some like to damage property as well as people. It’s part of The Beautiful game, you see.
Not only was I part of that world very much on the sidelines, I accepted it. I enjoyed it, too, at least most of the time. I never understood the fraternity of both codes of rugby fans who happily stand together and somehow manage to avoid punching each others’ lights out. In some ways, I still don’t, but I never crossed the line whereby I actually hit someone. But my general disillusionment with football, which began 20 years ago when I began to lose the emotional attachment with the only club I have ever supported, Bristol Rovers, has escalated in recent years, driven by the sheer excess of the Premier League and the corrupt international organisations. Now, I am at the point where I look at the prospects for disorder at Selhurst Park this Sunday as part of some distant world I am not part of. Thankfully.
What if there were no coppers present, just a handful of stewards in fluorescent coats? Let us be clear about this: there would be disorder, quite possibly widespread disorder, anarchy on the streets around the ground and on the terraces. It’s what happens at scores of football grounds around the country and indeed around the world every weekend. Does anyone think that without a large security presence the Forest team bus would pass peacefully through an angry crowd? Of course not. It is the great unsaid that coppers, private security firms and club stewards are there primarily to maintain some form of order. That is why Palace are so worried.
The emotions around football seem to be far greater and more extreme than any other sport. I know because I have felt that emotion before. It’s close to a loss of control, I know that, and it wouldn’t take long to lose it. But it’s a feeling that has slipped away from my life, something I began to realise when I started watching the game with both eyes open. The passion had gone and if the passion has gone with football, what’s left and what’s the point?
I hope everything goes off peacefully and safely on Sunday afternoon but if you are not at Selhurst Park, then don’t worry: the whole thing will be on Sky where Roy Keane, Jamie Carragher and Gary Neville will be able to talk you through it, in suitably dark tones if ‘it kicks off’.
I will find better things to do, perhaps watching the grass grow or watching paint dry. I have so far not watched a single game in its entirety so far this season and I don’t miss it. I certainly don’t miss the Saturday and Sunday hate and loathing and if things go very wrong on Sunday, I’ll be very glad it has nothing to do with my life anymore.
