In the horse's mouth

Last weekend, a few football fans in the north and south of England decided to do their bit for the stereotype of us all as snarling, atavistic, violent neanderthals, with trouble in both London and Newcastle. A few Millwall fans at Wembley decided they'd have a bit of a scrap amongst themselves, no doubt eliciting a rolling of eyes among the thousands of peaceful Millwall supporters all too used to being seen in that light regardless of the facts of the matter, while old enemies Sunderland and Newcastle did the dance of the thousand fists on the streets around town in the north-east.

(On that, Sunderland and Newcastle fans could easily identify each other from their shirts, but how did the Millwall fans know who to hit and who was hitting with them? Did somebody nip off to the gents' and knock up a few quick flags on bog paper, improvised heraldry for the idiot few to tell themselves apart? That'll baffle me for some time...)

Anyway, one individual has quickly become the 'icon', if that's the right word, for this display of first-class fuckwittery. 45-year-old Barry Rogerson has learned quickly that it's one thing to go around hitting fellow football fans, but it's quite another to punch a police horse. This nation of animal lovers does not take too kindly to that sort of thing, and our Baz has quickly found his name, age and former occupation plastered all over our beloved press.

This piece in the Express is particularly magnificent, encapsulating perfectly both the utterly moronic childishness of his actions, and the press's gleeful, pious response to it. Mr Rogerson has evidently realised how badly his actions have played out to a British public which probably has a regard for, and relationship with, animals which is unique in the world. If his taking part in the disorder in the first place was childish, his rapid backing-away from his actions subsequently makes him sound even more like an eight-year-old kid trying to pull the angelic innocent act in front of a sceptical parent.

"I'd like to apologise to the horse... ," he says. Only in Britain would this not sound utterly bonkers - I'm quite sure the horse is ready to shake hooves and put the whole thing behind them. Then this, from his wife, which is probably the best line in the whole piece: "He normally never goes out anywhere without me. I let him out once by himself and look what happens." See, officer? He's just a kid who got too excited, threw up his jelly and ice cream and then had a hissy fit, lashing out when the party broke up. So he faces a wrathful public, probably a wrathful wife, and will soon face the judgement of the law. Bet he's pleased he went to that game.

As a football fan myself, and despite not having anything violent or anti-social in my past to answer for in that regard myself, I feel the need to redress the balance a bit. We fans face enough mistrust and disdain from people outside the game as it is without Mr Rogerson and those like him doing their bit for the negative stereotypes. I'd urge you, if you have time, to read this, and this, or just type 'football fans charity' into Google and have a look at what comes up. The huge majority of us are just people, doing many more good things overall than bad, just like the rest of the population. If anything, the common bond and understanding of support, of any team, makes it easier for us to come together and act in unison where there's a need.

Most fans are mortified when they see this sort of stuff, so please don't go thinking that the photo of Barry Rogerson, face covered, punch mid-swing, which so many people have seen (and had confirm their opinion of football fans) is in any way typical of us.

Justice for the 96

Back in November of last year I wrote this piece, on the successful efforts of countless thousands of people in applying sufficient pressure on the Government to fully disclose documents relating to the Hillsborough disaster.

Those documents would not ordinarily be released for another 7 years, and their content shows that there are plenty of people with good reason to wish they hadn't been. Many of the families, and many within the football supporting community as a whole, have suspected all along that there was a cover up of the facts of the case. But just how shocking some of the revelations are has led to the Prime Minister standing in a packed and silent House of Commons to offer a formal apology for what he called the 'double injustice' of the original disaster and subsequent smearing and blame of the Liverpool fans.

Some of the main points raised by the independent review, but never published before today, include:

• New evidence about how the authorities failed, including documents which show a delay from the emergency services when people were being crushed (evidently up to 41 lives could have been saved if the emergency services had acted differently)
• Shortcomings in the response by the ambulance service and other emergency services in addition to failings by police
• Rescue attempts were held back by failures of leadership and co-ordination
• Victims' families were correct in their belief that some of the authorities attempted to create a "completely unjust" account of events that sought to blame the fans
• "Despicable untruths" about the behaviour of fans were part of police efforts "to develop and publicise a version of events that focused on allegations of drunkenness, ticketlessness and violence"
• Police officers carried out police national computer checks on those who had died in an attempt "to impugn the reputations of the deceased"
• 116 police statements amended or shortened to remove negative comments about South Yorkshire police's handling of the incident

These quoted from the BBC's website. 

23 years of campaigning for the truth are finally over, but this must not be the end. The findings of the original public enquiry must be quashed, and the people who have lied, the people who have covered up, and the people who have blamed the fans must be punished. The police's part in this must be revealed to the full glare of public scrutiny, and those responsible both for exacerbating the disaster and then smearing the victims in the aftermath must be punished.

I particularly want to see Kelvin MacKenzie sued for what he did. "The Truth", screamed his despicable rag, The Sun, while the victims still lay in the morgues. Liverpool fans caused the crush. Liverpool fans robbed the dead. Liverpool fans spat at, abused and urinated on police officers. It must be true, right? Football fans - tribal, snarling, atavistic scum, right? The Sun said it was their fault, and millions believed them. All now proven, as has been said all along by those who were there, to be utter lies. His former paper's forthcoming apology will cut little ice in Liverpool, where sales of The Sun have never recovered after what they did, and never will.

I want to hear Thatcher apologise for basically demonising football fans for years afterwards, choosing to believe the lies of a police officer over what eye witnesses were saying, and for her government's refusal to properly and impartially investigate what happened.

There is no sense of celebration, of course. The families and friends of the victims have vindication but not yet the full justice they crave. But they will. As I said back in November, the truth will out in the end. Tireless work by campaigners, notably among them Andy Burnham MP, who deserves great credit for his determination on this matter, is finally going to get justice for the 96.

Cheers, Hilary

I won't bore those of you not interested in the so far magnificent achievements of my three-points-clear-at-the-top team after last night's battling victory over Brentford, because something interesting in the programme caught my attention.

A local resident, a Mrs Hilary Ball (oddly appropriately), had taken the trouble of writing to the club to congratulate our fans on their behaviour during our ludicrously drawn-out tenure at Withdean. She wrote, "I had visions of beer bottles, cans and all sorts of rubbish dumped in the front garden, maybe windows smashed if a visiting team lost..." (No need to worry on that score most weeks...) "...and not being able to park outside my own house. I'm pleased to say none of this happened."

This is mainly due to the fact that, since a team of supporters volunteers to do a litter-pick in the area round the stadium after every home game, the area is actually cleaner after we play each match than before kick-off. It's one of the countless arrangements we had to come up with to get permission to play there in the first place. Her letter was in stark contrast to some of the other residents who must think we're no less than the spawn of Satan, as my own experience once showed.

I was walking the route from Preson Park station to the ground, an unpaved, muddy path through woods at the back of a line of private residences, on my way to a home game a couple of seasons ago, when a resident happened to come out of his garden to collect an empty cardboard beer crate that somebody had thoughtlessly dumped in the lane. Spotting my Brighton shirt, he gave me what can only be described as the skunk eye and muttered about 'hooligans dumping rubbish outside his house' in my direction. This could not go unchallenged, of course. I asked him why he was addressing his complaint at me, since I was clearly not the person who'd dumped the box. Again his eyes went to my shirt. That was all I needed to know.

The shirt had weighed, measured and found me wanting in his eyes. More than that, simply because I had the shirt of my football club on, he clearly viewed me as not only exactly the same as the dick who'd dumped the box outside his house, but somehow personally responsible for it. I told him, politely, that a shirt does not a boor make, that whoever dumped the box would be a dick whether they sported a football shirt or not. Whether they ever even watched football or not, in fact. But this clearly didn't fit with his preconception of the shaven-headed, drunken, inarticulate, snarling wretch that is doubtless his exemplar of fans everywhere, so back into his house he went, huffing and puffing.

So as we near the end of our tenure there, I hope that fans and local residents have learned something about each other. We're not all mindless hoolies, and they don't all hate us. Mrs Ball even complimented the new stadium blossoming on the hillside in Falmer, saying, "It will be a magnificent building when it is finished and a huge asset to the city. I might even be tempted to come and watch my first professional football match when you move."

Good on you, Mrs B. Glad we've been good tenants. Unfortunately though, should we leave Withdean this season with some silverware, Mr Beer Box will doubtless assume we've nicked it.