Lyon-Marseille incidents: how France could take an example from England with “a global policy – Franceinfo

The excesses that occurred Sunday, November 21 at Groupama Stadium during the meeting between Olympique Lyonnais and Olympique de Marseille, are the eighth serious incidents since the start of the Ligue 1 season. By their frequency, these incidents are reminiscent of any proportion kept, those who rocked England in football in the late 1980s.

If, unlike our English neighbors, no deaths were to be deplored, their management of this crisis allowed the introduction of many measures – exclusion of clubs for five years from European Cups, expulsion of violent supporters for life , rise in seat prices, ban on standing and establishment of seats – which allowed to draw a line on this wave of violence generated by the British hooligans. Even today, English football has never again reached such levels of violence even if incidents remain, such as the assault in the middle of a match on the lawn of Jack Grealish by an individual in 2019.

While the Minister of the Interior Gérald Darmanin and Roxana Maracineanu, Minister Delegate in charge of Sports, receive Tuesday, November 23 the Professional Football League (LFP), the French Football Federation (FFF), the representatives of the referees as well as the representatives from several football clubs, Nicolas Hourcade, sociologist at the Ecole Centrale de Lyon and specialist in football supporters, analyzes for franceinfo: sport the English case, which could perhaps provide food for thought to French authorities.

At the end of the 1980s, English football was confronted with two tragedies, that of Heysel (1985) and that of Hillsborough (1989), causing the deaths of 39 and 96 people respectively. How did the British handle such a situation?

Nicolas Hourcade: The successes against hooliganism date back to the 1990s. Following the Sheffield drama (or Hillsborough disaster, named after the stadium where 96 people died crushed against the gates after a gigantic crowd movement), a report official has been published and has put forward two important points. On the one hand, the need to act against violent supporters. On the other, the reception of supporters in unworthy conditions.

In the 1990s, a global policy was put in place in England, which consisted on the one hand in having uncompromising action towards deviant supporters, and on the other hand in renovating all the stadiums, in order to better accommodate other supporters. . These decisions went hand in hand with the creation of the Premier League (in 1992), and its transformation into the first international championship. At the same time, there was a very strong increase in prices because we had to build new stadiums and attract the best players.

Could we in France be inspired by the English model?

I see two lessons for France. First, the need to target troublemakers. For now, there is a lot of talk about general sanctions on clubs or behind closed doors, but what has allowed the English to achieve success in this area is thanks to the individual targeting of troublemakers, to ban them. access to the stadium, and any exit from the territory for away matches. It is a police action of the public and judicial powers.

Then, they set up a global policy, in other words a reflection at the top of the State with the sports authorities to see which model they wanted to apply. What is interesting is that the Germans had the same thinking as the English at the same time, but they did not make the same choices.

The Germans have chosen to keep standing places and accessible prices, while being, like the English, very firm and repressive in the face of troublemakers. They tried to develop a more positive supportism by setting up a whole work of dialogue with the associations of supporters and of social prevention to prevent supporters from sinking into violence.

Would these two options you mention be applicable in France?

Yes both options would be applicable. The authorities are aware of this. This is why the author of the projectile launched yesterday on Dimitri Payet was quickly arrested and that he is currently in police custody. There is the will to have that answer. But it is a response that costs money because the police and justice are mobilized.

The measures taken at the time by the English are still effective today since such incidents did not happen again …

I would have said yes until a short time ago, but since the public returned to the stadiums, there have been a few incidents. This is out of all proportion to what we experienced in the 1980s, but we must be aware that at the European level, there have been many excesses in a certain number of stadiums, and not only in France.

It is difficult to explain why. There is the hypothesis that after months without a publicly accessible match, some come back with real enthusiasm and others with misplaced excitement. There is a concern and we wonder if this violence is cyclical, and that it will subside once people have resumed the habit of going to the stadium, or if it is a more structural problem of reinforcement of violence. It’s complicated to say.