GermanShepherd
New member
hi all,
dont worry, i wont warm the whole thing up again, but a few things have been adressed and progress has been made.
first of all respect to the south-wales echo who, for the very first time, showed pictures of oe of the victims, a mother of 3. she needed 15 stitches in her face after being hit numerous times by police truncheons
link
then, south wales police issued a detailed statement about the events last saturday. it states that the disorder caused by very few cardiff fans escalated into a major confrontation because of police tactics. this was also confirmed by wolves stewards. the situation then had calmed down when minutes later riot police came storming into the section, hitting people regardless of behaviour, age, sex or dress.
the club now takes records and accounts of fans, who witnessed what happened.
the club received offers from other clubs, amongst them Bristol City, Leicester City and Manchester United, in supporting cardiff city's complaints about west midlands police. those clubs had more than once or twice, simular problems with WMP.
in all good news, SWP also said the statement of WMP of trying to ban cardiff fans, is just a sign of inability to police a game. how right they are...
finally, a very good account by a cardiff fan from that day. he is a member of the official supporters club, who organises the travels for families, those coaches stricly forbid any kind of alcohol or yobbish behaviour.
"I've seen a fair few Cardiff games away from home over the last five years or so and this policing operation(if that's the word for it) was the worse I have have seen in that period.
Let's start right at the beggining way, way back when discussions were due to open regarding the game? Why didn't West Midlands Police send a representitive to Cardiff, or provide an invitation for the Wayne Nash etc to travel to Wolves to discuss policing for the event. My understanding is this is the norm for any of our away fixtures. On what grounds did they refuse?
Secondly, why did they give the wrong RV point to the relavant groups? Intetionally I would guess. Trying to wind us up before we even get near the ground. If this was a genuine mistake then maybe if they had decided to have discussion with the club as stated above, things may have been a little clearer. After sitting around for 10 minutes waiting for their finest to turn up, we get told we are in the wrong place. Or more to the point the police are!
When getting to the ground I found it quite dangerous after alighting our coaches that we had to make our own way across a dual carriageway whilst the police just watched!! They wanted us to go straight to the ground so why not stop the traffic and guide us across. Some of the older members of the group were clearly strugling. Another attempt to wind things up maybe?
Stewards outside the ground were friendly enough had a joke about the amount of electricals I had on my - my phone, mp3 player and camera. Kiosk staff were great and I tucked into my meat and potato pie with delight.
First half passed without incident.
The half time whistle went and you could hear people chanting "We want beer". Looking under the stand people were laughing at this and seemed to be in a pretty joyful mood considering the state of our first half performance on the field. All of a sudden a lot of shouting went up and I saw uniformed police swinging their battons. Incident bystanders were injured and the police showed little if any remorse. This was followed by a large amount of riot police filling the space beneath the stand. If I said these uniformed police showed little remorse I can only comment that the riot police acted like animals. They were pushing, shoving and re-inflaiming a situation that had started to die down. There was a crush as people were just trying to get out of the way of these batton-wielding lunatics. Of course with people pushing in different directions bystanders were pushed into the police and therefore rained down on with battons and shields. Did the police try and calm things down
Nope they thourght it would be better to release MORE police into the stand! Now let's remember this is a confined space that is already over it's capacity. Was this really a sensible move?
Luckily I hadn't ventured too much into the stand and was able to get out not physically hurt but feeling extreme anger at what I had just saw. It could have so easily have been me under that stand getting smashed around - all because of what Wanting a cup of coffee?
After getting back into the stand I moved across just to try and free up some space for people to get out of the gangways. All of a sudden there are police and dogs marching up the side of the pitch going through the gangways and dragging people out by the scruff of their necks. When getting to the top of the stairs, no matter what age or sex - they were chucked through the line of officers and into the seating area. This resulted in ANOTHER crush. There was simply not enough capacity in this block to keep all these people in. This meant an overflow ending up on the pitch. Luckily it was the stewards who got to these fans first and protected them. I dread to think what would have happened if it was the police who had got to them. Would have they just smashed these aswell?!? Would have been a continuation of what I had saw previously.
When the second half had got away and after being spat at and recieving numerous missiles from the crowd above us - we made our way out of the ground. After my experience from Mollineux last year when their was a lot of disorder - I made my excuses and decided to delay departing the stadium by a minute or so and clapped the team off.
I got outside and everything was relativly calm, which was a pleasnt suprised. There was a large group of Cardiff fans trying to get a burger or hot dog from a van but apart from that, most were making it upto the coach park. One problem being not everyone parked in the coach park - but even still. Hear shouting again look down the hill and I see riot police running into the Cardiff Fans around the burger van again swinging their battons. What was the morale of the story? Was it do what the police say or we will hammer you with a batton?? If they didn't want people to gather around this area why let a burger van park there and secondly why not ensure it was shut after the game? Or wouldn't have this given the police yet another excuse to raise their battons.
Upon getting back to the coach park, finding the relavant coach wasn't easy. I travelled with the Cardiff City Supporters Club so there were about 7 coaches that look identical so went to look for which coach I was travelling on. Got confronted by one policeman who asked "Where are you going 'taffy'", my response being "to get my coach sir". Apparantly this was enough to deserve a dig in the side with his shield? Got on my coach and that was the end of my experience, or so I thourght.
Oh no, not content with just being agressive and rude all day they had enough time to raid all of our coaches. Leave my coat and bag scattered in the comparments above my seat. Cheers!!!
Finally I raise the followng points.
1. Why no communication between the club before the fixture. West Midlands obviously found it quite a High Profile due to the amount of officers on patrol. More than at the Millennium Stadium for the Carling Cup Final to handle over 70000.
2. Why were we told beer would be freely available in the ground although not available to Cardiff Fans in pubs, if this wasn't true. Come half time this wasn't available. If you want trust it has to be both ways and we were let down here.
3. Why after the inital confirtation had cooled regarding the beer underneath the stand was there a need to continue adding more police to an already compressed area.
4. Why did police insist on coming through the middle of the stand. If they hadn't Wolves fans would not have been aware what had happened and wouldn't have tried to inflame the situation further by chanting anti-welsh songs.
5 Why wasn't there a bit more tact used for fans leaving the stadium. Closing the burger bar would have been a start.
MOST IMPORTANTLY - Why is it that as soon as you are cateogrised as a football fan you lose all of your human rights.
This has gone on a lot more that I expected, but that's my view of the day. If it's not any use then fair enough. But it's what I saw and somthing I am sick to the back teeth with."
dont worry, i wont warm the whole thing up again, but a few things have been adressed and progress has been made.
first of all respect to the south-wales echo who, for the very first time, showed pictures of oe of the victims, a mother of 3. she needed 15 stitches in her face after being hit numerous times by police truncheons
link
then, south wales police issued a detailed statement about the events last saturday. it states that the disorder caused by very few cardiff fans escalated into a major confrontation because of police tactics. this was also confirmed by wolves stewards. the situation then had calmed down when minutes later riot police came storming into the section, hitting people regardless of behaviour, age, sex or dress.
the club now takes records and accounts of fans, who witnessed what happened.
the club received offers from other clubs, amongst them Bristol City, Leicester City and Manchester United, in supporting cardiff city's complaints about west midlands police. those clubs had more than once or twice, simular problems with WMP.
in all good news, SWP also said the statement of WMP of trying to ban cardiff fans, is just a sign of inability to police a game. how right they are...
finally, a very good account by a cardiff fan from that day. he is a member of the official supporters club, who organises the travels for families, those coaches stricly forbid any kind of alcohol or yobbish behaviour.
"I've seen a fair few Cardiff games away from home over the last five years or so and this policing operation(if that's the word for it) was the worse I have have seen in that period.
Let's start right at the beggining way, way back when discussions were due to open regarding the game? Why didn't West Midlands Police send a representitive to Cardiff, or provide an invitation for the Wayne Nash etc to travel to Wolves to discuss policing for the event. My understanding is this is the norm for any of our away fixtures. On what grounds did they refuse?
Secondly, why did they give the wrong RV point to the relavant groups? Intetionally I would guess. Trying to wind us up before we even get near the ground. If this was a genuine mistake then maybe if they had decided to have discussion with the club as stated above, things may have been a little clearer. After sitting around for 10 minutes waiting for their finest to turn up, we get told we are in the wrong place. Or more to the point the police are!
When getting to the ground I found it quite dangerous after alighting our coaches that we had to make our own way across a dual carriageway whilst the police just watched!! They wanted us to go straight to the ground so why not stop the traffic and guide us across. Some of the older members of the group were clearly strugling. Another attempt to wind things up maybe?
Stewards outside the ground were friendly enough had a joke about the amount of electricals I had on my - my phone, mp3 player and camera. Kiosk staff were great and I tucked into my meat and potato pie with delight.
First half passed without incident.
The half time whistle went and you could hear people chanting "We want beer". Looking under the stand people were laughing at this and seemed to be in a pretty joyful mood considering the state of our first half performance on the field. All of a sudden a lot of shouting went up and I saw uniformed police swinging their battons. Incident bystanders were injured and the police showed little if any remorse. This was followed by a large amount of riot police filling the space beneath the stand. If I said these uniformed police showed little remorse I can only comment that the riot police acted like animals. They were pushing, shoving and re-inflaiming a situation that had started to die down. There was a crush as people were just trying to get out of the way of these batton-wielding lunatics. Of course with people pushing in different directions bystanders were pushed into the police and therefore rained down on with battons and shields. Did the police try and calm things down
Nope they thourght it would be better to release MORE police into the stand! Now let's remember this is a confined space that is already over it's capacity. Was this really a sensible move?Luckily I hadn't ventured too much into the stand and was able to get out not physically hurt but feeling extreme anger at what I had just saw. It could have so easily have been me under that stand getting smashed around - all because of what
Wanting a cup of coffee?After getting back into the stand I moved across just to try and free up some space for people to get out of the gangways. All of a sudden there are police and dogs marching up the side of the pitch going through the gangways and dragging people out by the scruff of their necks. When getting to the top of the stairs, no matter what age or sex - they were chucked through the line of officers and into the seating area. This resulted in ANOTHER crush. There was simply not enough capacity in this block to keep all these people in. This meant an overflow ending up on the pitch. Luckily it was the stewards who got to these fans first and protected them. I dread to think what would have happened if it was the police who had got to them. Would have they just smashed these aswell?!? Would have been a continuation of what I had saw previously.
When the second half had got away and after being spat at and recieving numerous missiles from the crowd above us - we made our way out of the ground. After my experience from Mollineux last year when their was a lot of disorder - I made my excuses and decided to delay departing the stadium by a minute or so and clapped the team off.
I got outside and everything was relativly calm, which was a pleasnt suprised. There was a large group of Cardiff fans trying to get a burger or hot dog from a van but apart from that, most were making it upto the coach park. One problem being not everyone parked in the coach park - but even still. Hear shouting again look down the hill and I see riot police running into the Cardiff Fans around the burger van again swinging their battons. What was the morale of the story? Was it do what the police say or we will hammer you with a batton?? If they didn't want people to gather around this area why let a burger van park there and secondly why not ensure it was shut after the game? Or wouldn't have this given the police yet another excuse to raise their battons.
Upon getting back to the coach park, finding the relavant coach wasn't easy. I travelled with the Cardiff City Supporters Club so there were about 7 coaches that look identical so went to look for which coach I was travelling on. Got confronted by one policeman who asked "Where are you going 'taffy'", my response being "to get my coach sir". Apparantly this was enough to deserve a dig in the side with his shield? Got on my coach and that was the end of my experience, or so I thourght.
Oh no, not content with just being agressive and rude all day they had enough time to raid all of our coaches. Leave my coat and bag scattered in the comparments above my seat. Cheers!!!
Finally I raise the followng points.
1. Why no communication between the club before the fixture. West Midlands obviously found it quite a High Profile due to the amount of officers on patrol. More than at the Millennium Stadium for the Carling Cup Final to handle over 70000.
2. Why were we told beer would be freely available in the ground although not available to Cardiff Fans in pubs, if this wasn't true. Come half time this wasn't available. If you want trust it has to be both ways and we were let down here.
3. Why after the inital confirtation had cooled regarding the beer underneath the stand was there a need to continue adding more police to an already compressed area.
4. Why did police insist on coming through the middle of the stand. If they hadn't Wolves fans would not have been aware what had happened and wouldn't have tried to inflame the situation further by chanting anti-welsh songs.
5 Why wasn't there a bit more tact used for fans leaving the stadium. Closing the burger bar would have been a start.
MOST IMPORTANTLY - Why is it that as soon as you are cateogrised as a football fan you lose all of your human rights.
This has gone on a lot more that I expected, but that's my view of the day. If it's not any use then fair enough. But it's what I saw and somthing I am sick to the back teeth with."
Yes I am sure that is the reason
