Not liking the reports coming out from Athens

[disco]

disco i was there, people surged forwards cos there was no turnstile only some mickey mouse barrier checking peoples tickets. why cant you accept that its fans impatience of trying to get in, instead of building some front page nonsense of thousands of fans without tickets are to blame

Stop putting words into my mouth. I have never given a number.

I've been to major finals (believe it or not!) and seen the tricks people do to get in (on a much smaller scale). If they can't just ****ing sneak in past a barrier they try and push through.

Are you seriously trying to claim that hardly anyone got in without a ticket? Don't make me laugh

[Monkeywool]

There are a lot of factors at play here.

The ticket allocation was a shambles, too many sponsors getting the ticket and winding up on the black market is going to cause a **** load of problems, everyone knew that. Parry even said that recently. That has been done to death though so I won't comment on that any more.

The thing that irks me more than anything is the fact that UEFA in order to "bring the game to Europe" or whatever they try to do is pick some **** ****ing places to play a final, just because it's a nice stadium or something. Athens, nice place for sure, just done the olympics fair enough. On paper that is good because they have in theory the infrastructure in place to deal with big crowds and things.

Thats the problem, football fans are completely and utterly different than the rar rar olympic goers. How the **** can a stadium which has had a history of this EXACT problem that we had last night be granted a champions league final?

Putting AEK athens in a search engine this article comes up first

http://www.football.co.uk/aek_athens/index.shtml

The match between AEK Athens and Levadiakos on the 27th November was interupted by the fans. A fight broke loose against fans and police, a television broadcasting van was also attacked and set on fire during the brawl.A police report has said that the fight broke loose as over 500 Athens fans tried to get in the stadium without tickets.

Why oh ****ing why do the authorities not ****ing only put in the CL final stadiums which have no problems in countries who know just how to administrate and support a football match instead of ones that are going to be easily scared and treat football fans like ****?

Final point, people who do bunk in, or snatch tickets from people waiting in the queue are in fact part of a huge problem, which would be eradicated by actually changing the ticketing system to make more proof of identity paramount. As well as changing the ****e places that we have to go to, who can't organise something on this scale anyway. Do those things and these problems never happen again.

Next CL final is in Moscow.......... It will be even worse than this year if an English club get there unless UEFA sort out their **** and get from the dark ages and actually make their cash cow more of a fan focussed place (one fella on the sky show just is a wheelchair user, they had no ramps or accessible toilets for him for example), if it wasn't for the fans, then UEFA wouldn't have their champions league anyway. Sponsors would not sponsor a competition which no one watched. It is time for UEFA to remember what they are there for.

Final point, Thompson on Sky Sports now, "UEFA blaming Liverpool fans is deflecting the issue, I would say to Gillard, look at your football family mate"

[Revo]

Mickey mouse nonsense or not you were still prepared to pay a lot of money in air fares and in forged tickets or whatever to try to get in. Only a fool or a desperate can do that, sorry.

i dont want to take anymore of your time fredo, seans waithing for his crayon drawings

[Lecter]

like i said in another thread, its funny there was none in istanbul when things were better organised.!

I think thats a great point

It made me laugh that UEFA said there wasnt a problem for Milan fans

No **** sherlock they returned nearly 5000 tickets

Better policing would have prvented ticketless and those with forged tickets from getting near the ground

Poor organisation and policing is what led to the problem getting out of control

[Revo]

Stop putting words into my mouth. I have never given a number.

I've been to major finals (believe it or not!) and seen the tricks people do to get in (on a much smaller scale). If they can't just ****ing sneak in past a barrier they try and push through.

Are you seriously trying to claim that hardly anyone got in without a ticket? Don't make me laugh

i am saying we will never know because we dont know how many fans bought unsuspecting forgeries

[sean_lfc]

But sean, even if they've spent loads, what's the money compared to the safety of people?

Nothing, really.

However I still believe the whole thing was organised very poorly as DS and Tommy have mentioned having seen it first-hand. To put blame solely on the fans is wrong. It was and still is in UEFA's hands as to

a) which country & stadium they use to arrange the final (a footballing nation which deals with these things on a large scale on a weekly basis will be more adept than a country which doesn't)
b) how fans without tickets are kept from the ground
c) how fans with tickets can get into the ground promptly and without fail
d) how tickets are allocated in general
e) how to make tickets that are very hard to forge
etc.etc.

If these points get sorted out beforehand there would be much less danger.

[disco]

It's all very very depressing.

Reddragon - really sorry to hear about your experience. Sounds like the whole thing reflects badly on everyone. We're blamin Uefa and police, they're blaming us, the "truth" lying somewhere inbetween.

[Guest]

I think thats a great point

It made me laugh that UEFA said there wasnt a problem for Milan fans

No **** sherlock they returned nearly 5000 tickets

Better policing would have prvented ticketless and those with forged tickets from getting near the ground

Poor organisation and policing is what led to the problem getting out of control

Policing would mean what ? Beating the **** out of fans who are trying to get in without tickets ? Talking with them in trying to explain to them they have no right to go in thus avoiding any altercation ?

Sorry, I feel, as supporters we should be a little more responsible, that's all. It's in the culture methinks, none more than that.

[Bob]

It is painful but at least it's easy to see both sides of the argument from up here.

Makes a pleasant from your horse as well.

Sorry, just want to pick on someone to get my anger out, and you seemed as good as any.

[disco]

i am saying we will never know because we dont know how many fans bought unsuspecting forgeries

(or were there with forgeries they made themselves)

Fair point, let's hope we don't get a repeat

[sean_lfc]

There are a lot of factors at play here.

The ticket allocation was a shambles, too many sponsors getting the ticket and winding up on the black market is going to cause a **** load of problems, everyone knew that. Parry even said that recently. That has been done to death though so I won't comment on that any more.

The thing that irks me more than anything is the fact that UEFA in order to "bring the game to Europe" or whatever they try to do is pick some **** ****ing places to play a final, just because it's a nice stadium or something. Athens, nice place for sure, just done the olympics fair enough. On paper that is good because they have in theory the infrastructure in place to deal with big crowds and things.

Thats the problem, football fans are completely and utterly different than the rar rar olympic goers. How the **** can a stadium which has had a history of this EXACT problem that we had last night be granted a champions league final?

Putting AEK athens in a search engine this article comes up first

http://www.football.co.uk/aek_athens/index.shtml

The match between AEK Athens and Levadiakos on the 27th November was interupted by the fans. A fight broke loose against fans and police, a television broadcasting van was also attacked and set on fire during the brawl.A police report has said that the fight broke loose as over 500 Athens fans tried to get in the stadium without tickets.

Why oh ****ing why do the authorities not ****ing only put in the CL final stadiums which have no problems in countries who know just how to administrate and support a football match instead of ones that are going to be easily scared and treat football fans like ****?

Final point, people who do bunk in, or snatch tickets from people waiting in the queue are in fact part of a huge problem, which would be eradicated by actually changing the ticketing system to make more proof of identity paramount. As well as changing the ****e places that we have to go to, who can't organise something on this scale anyway. Do those things and these problems never happen again.

Next CL final is in Moscow.......... It will be even worse than this year if an English club get there unless UEFA sort out their **** and get from the dark ages and actually make their cash cow more of a fan focussed place (one fella on the sky show just is a wheelchair user, they had no ramps or accessible toilets for him for example), if it wasn't for the fans, then UEFA wouldn't have their champions league anyway. Sponsors would not sponsor a competition which no one watched. It is time for UEFA to remember what they are there for.

Final point, Thompson on Sky Sports now, "UEFA blaming Liverpool fans is deflecting the issue, I would say to Gillard, look at your football family mate"

[Lecter]

Tickletless fans SHOULDNT TRY TO GET IN, end of.

Your argument is a bit like saying car companies are responsible for car theft, because they price their product too high...

They shouldnt but its endemic amongst our support when demand always exceeds supply (bunking in is almost an olympic event for scousers)

I think UEFA and the police were both aware of the scale of travelling fans with or without tickets and its their job to organise and deal with these fans

The fact that so many ticketless and those with forgeries got into the ground only goes to show their failures

I am not condoning those who try to bunk in BUT policies should be put into effect to deal with these effectively and correctly

Istanbul effectively dealt with the problem, Athens didnt

[Craig_H]

Nothing, really.

However I still believe the whole thing was organised very poorly as DS and Tommy have mentioned having seen it first-hand. To put blame solely on the fans is wrong. It was and still is in UEFA's hands as to

a) which country & stadium they use to arrange the final (a footballing nation which deals with these things on a large scale on a weekly basis will be more adept than a country which doesn't)
b) how fans without tickets are kept from the ground
c) how fans with tickets can get into the ground promptly and without fail
d) how tickets are allocated in general
e) how to make tickets that are very hard to forge
etc.etc.

If these points get sorted out beforehand there would be much less danger.

I saw it first hand too mate (read my first couple of posts on the thread, page 3 or 4 i think) and i've kept saying the blame lies in several different areas. Some fans arent blameless, but it's a combination of blame that comes together and leaves us with the mess of last night.

[Guest]

i dont want to take anymore of your time fredo, seans waithing for his crayon drawings

Whatever, as you have been talking like a 20 year old anyway. :whatever:

[disco]

Policing would mean what ? Beating the **** out of fans who are trying to get in without tickets ? Talking with them in trying to explain to them they have no right to go in thus avoiding any altercation ?

Sorry, I feel, as supporters we should be a little more responsible, that's all. It's in the culture methinks, none more than that.

I think Lecter was saying that ticketless fans was the problem (as well as forgeries), but it was policed very very badly.

You're right though - some people think it's ok to try and get in without a ticket at the expense of others.