Is that all we get away?

I have written frequently about the dreadful experience of away fans at European games. Things aren’t getting any better. That needs to change.

Anna Burgess has seen it all before. She’s travelled all over Europe following Liverpool FC for years, and she represents away supporters on the Spirit of Shankly supporters union committee. Like most regulars at European aways, she isn’t surprised by shoddy treatment. But the recent trip to Istanbul made her even more determined that things must change.

The game was by no means the worst experience Liverpool fans have had. But it’s the constant low-level experience of what is, to be frank, utter contempt that is really hitting home – and not just at Liverpool. Most fans knew what they were letting themselves in for, but the official advice given out by Liverpool for travelling fans left little doubt.

Here’s a selection of choice cuts.

• You must carry photo ID at all times.

• Your only access to the stadium is via buses with no access or toilet facilities, that would take at least an hour to complete their journey.

• You will not be able to take anything that could be used as a projectile into the stadium – including phone chargers needed to ensure phones with digital tickets work.

• You may be held back for up to 90 minutes after the game.

But, says Anna, “there were nowhere near enough coaches. A few mates said that when they arrived there was no space for them. They rang the club to see what to do and they were told to make their own way. Despite being told not to do that in the official advice.”

At the gates, says Anna “it was a racket – pure and simple theft. I’ve reflected on the female stewards going through my bag and it was like they were shopping and picking out what they wanted to keep. Absolutely outrageous. Some girls had Tampax and sanitary products confiscated.”

Again, Anna is not unfamiliar with items being taken. A few seasons back, away in Europe, she had a phone charger confiscated “because you might give it to a man to throw”. Where do you even start with that?

“There’s a lot made of wanting to get a different sort of fan to games, and we know they don’t want people like us there really,” said Anna. “But how are you going to attract that demographic if you can’t take a lippy in, or some hand gel to at least make the toilets useable when there is no soap, no hot water and often no lighting?”

She emphasises that no one should have to put up with this sort of treatment, but makes the point as yet another illustration of the game UEFA and the clubs talk and the one they walk.

“I went there knowing that they would likely take things, but I didn’t realise it would be as blatant,” she says. “When I left, there was loads of rubbish on the floor and items they had confiscated that were of no interest to them. Unsurprisingly, the bags with all of the things they clearly wanted to keep had gone.”

There were problems inside the stadium too. “The lads I was on the trip with said that they couldn’t get to their seats because all the police were in them. I realise nobody goes to their seat on a European away, but it was very cramped in the stands.”

Other fans I spoke to were told they would not be allowed to take inhalers in, despite being asthmatic. When Spurs played in Istanbul last season, fans were advised that diabetic needles and epi-pens were banned. They were told “the club doctor will administer any injections”. Seriously!

I’ve been writing about this for years, and it seems that the issue is beginning to be picked up by the mainstream media. Henry Winter has been consistent in raising it for some time, and articles such as the one carried by the Daily Mail about Liverpool’s visit to Istanbul will help – although that piece still buys into the idea that harsh measures are necessary because of potential crowd trouble.

For change to happen, fans need to speak up and demand better. But clubs must do the same. Too often there is a reticence to challenge in case it makes things worse, but this is just giving in to intimidation. In my experience, there’s also an unwillingness to make waves with other clubs you might need to do you a favour in future. Clubs need to start putting their fans, their paying customers, first.

Anna says: “I’m going to email the club to ask for a wash-up meeting and just a general discussion about our treatment in Europe. We really need to start doing stuff around the St Denis convention.”

Few have heard of the convention, and it is scarcely used. But it is a valuable tool. It is, in full, the Council of Europe Convention on an Integrated Safety, Security and Service Approach at Football Matches and Other Sports Events. I wrote about it in some detail two and a half years ago, and the independent review into the shocking events at the 2022 Champions League Final described it as follows.

“The aim of the Saint-Denis Convention is to provide a safe, secure, and welcoming environment at football matches and other sports events with an international dimension. In order to achieve this, Parties shall:

“a. Adopt an integrated, multi-agency and balanced approach towards safety, security and service, based on an ethos of effective local, national and international partnerships and cooperation;

“b. Ensure that all public and private agencies, and other stakeholders, recognise that safety, security, and service provision cannot be considered in isolation and can have a direct influence on delivery of the other two components;

“c. Take account of good practices in developing an integrated approach to safety, security and service.”

To put it bluntly – this is not happening. And despite the damning verdict of the Review on UEFA’s role, that organisation is still not stepping up to do what it could. There have been improvements, with the dogged efforts of Football Supporters Europe securing regular discussion and consultation on fan affairs where before there was none. But too often those forums become platforms for excuses about why UEFA can’t really do anything when it is the local authorities who really make the decisions.

It is true that, particularly in France and Spain, local police forces are a law unto themselves. And that too many local councils view football fans as a problem first and guests a poor second. But could and should UEFA be doing more as the competition organiser?

Spurs fan Kat Law is a member of the Football Supporters Europe board, and co-ordinates work around English clubs in European competition. She’s also a member of UEFA’s Fan Advisory Forum, so unlike many fans she has a direct line into the organisation. And she says there have been improvements. “UEFA’s new stadium regulations mean the things they can control are improving in some areas – but that’s on the stadium footprint, not beyond. Multi-agency work is the challenge,” she says.

UEFA, powerful as it is, can’t compel police or public authorities to do anything, and it is often their decisions that cause the most problems. But there are things UEFA can do.

Among the measures Kat and others are pushing for is a standard list of items that are permitted to be taken into stadiums – and that should include medical supplies. “It’s one thing when the approach to fans causes inconvenience,” says Kat, “but quite another when people’s health is being put at risk. That has to change.”

Staging European competition games generates money and profile for the cities in which they are held. Where the safety of visitors cannot be guaranteed, where visitors are routinely attacked by security forces and preyed upon by stewards, where basic principles of hospitality and safety are absent, UEFA could, as the competition organiser, refuse to allocate games to cities.

But withdrawing games, especially at short notice, presents its own logistical challenges. This is not an easy solution, but a line has to be drawn somewhere and somehow.

Fans are beginning to organise more strongly around these issues, with all fans of English clubs involved in European competition meeting regularly under the umbrella of the FSE and the Football Supporters Association as part of a process that feeds into structured dialogue with UEFA. Supporter networks in other countries are considering similar.

But clubs need to be more prepared to submit complaints to the official UEFA delegate at games about any issues – because that is the route UEFA has to respond through.

The great irony in all of this is that punitive measures are said to be necessary because of the risk of fan violence. But more often I hear from fans of all clubs that trips reveal great cities and hospitable people, but poor policing and matchday experience. It is too often the measures introduced to prevent trouble that cause it.

One fan I spoke to didn’t make the trip to Istanbul because he’d had enough. “Planning for a shit trip, experiencing one, reflecting on it as one and paying top dollar. At 64, who needs it!” he said. Many more will go, fuelling complacency that there will always be an audience. There will be, but that doesn’t make treating it badly right.

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UEFA’s approval of two domestic league games, one from Spain and one from Italy, to be played outside those countries has predictably caused a storm – and attracted ridicule as the organisation has said it is approving the games on the basis that it doesn’t approve of them and isn’t setting a precedent.

The problem for UEFA is that, ultimately, it is FIFA that makes the decision on whether to grant approval, and it turns out FIFA’s regulations are probably too flimsy to withstand a possible legal challenge. Blocking the requests from La Liga and Serie A could therefore prompt a legal action which, if successful in getting the games to go ahead, really would set a precedent.

That’s something a few of the apocalyptic articles in the press don’t seem to be considering, and the fact that all 55 UEFA member associations have committed not to make further such requests without consulting UEFA has also been overlooked in the rush to declare the end of football as we know it. Critics say the commitment to consult is “meaningless” – and the past attitude of most football authorities to the concept of consultation has understandably prompted cynicism – but no commitment at all would be even more meaningless.

Make no mistake, these matches going ahead – Villarreal v Barcelona in Miami, USA, and Como and AC Milan in Perth, Australia – is A Very Bad Thing. It tears up the level playing field in both those leagues, as every team will not have played the same number of matches under the same conditions. It directly undermines the ticket to every home game brought by season ticket holders – something that could itself prompt legal action – and it allows the argument for precedent to be put in future.

But it’s also possible the attempt will prompt football’s competition organisers to get their houses in order. This week the European Parliament voted to adopt a report on the role of EU policy in shaping the European Sport Model (ESM). As this X thread from Football Supporters Europe points out, the ESM “specifically ‘calls on the sport’s governing bodies to prevent domestic competition matches from being played abroad’.” It also calls for the ESM to be protected “against pure-profit entertainment models” and for “the involvement of fans in decision making.”

FSE’s own statement may be a bit pragmatic for some, but it is a realistic and sensible stance – one that pins responsibility where it should be (on FIFA and the respective leagues) and which acknowledges the unity that has been achieved in the short time since this latest attempt to undermine the domestic football model was announced. It could yet help win the war that this battle is only a part of.

The photo at the top of this post shows the view from the away end at Galatasaray v Liverpool in this season’s Champions League. © Anna Burgess