- Video
-
Club Roar
Captured a great grassroots sporting moment? We want to see it!Content Collections
The Roar Community
- Join
- Login
The new reports of fan violence blasting across mainstream media and internet news sites should have every genuine football fan worried.
Once again Australian football fans have become their own worst enemy with the violence that erupted between Wanderers and Victory fans before yesterday’s games.
Rival fans reportedly confronted each other outside a pub and threw flares while breaking chairs and glasses.
Headlines for the actual game that fans are meant to be supporting has become lost in the blaze of bad publicity.
How do we as fans respond to this?
Should we curse the evil mainstream media for reporting the brawl that left people being hospitalised? Or were they just reporting what actually happened?
Should we retort with that oft-quoted claim that hundreds of people are ejected from the cricket yet no one bats an eyelid? Despite the fact no news outlets with any commercial ties to cricket’s success have reported any such similar behaviour.
Or do we as actual fans who appreciate the game (you know, the type of people who actually watch the game and not go on about how great the crowd was) stand up to these idiots and call them out for creating more harm to the game than good.
This is not Europe. They are not some quasi-European football firm. And this type of violence is not part of football culture or Australian culture for that matter.
Put down the flares, put down the chairs and the glasses, stop ripping off English football chants and claiming them as your own and appreciate the game for what it is.
I am football – are they?
Are you the ultimate team manager? Pick your own superstar team and go head to head with other football fans for glory and cash prizes on Draftstars. Imagine what you could be buying instead. Set a deposit limit.