Earlier this week, as Luton Town crashed out of the play-offs, at the hands of Huddersfield Town, we felt obliged to publish an article.
It covered the unsavoury scenes, at the end of the game, where a group of Huddersfield lads, decided it was the cool thing to launch a series of objects into the area of seating occupied by Luton’s travelling army.
Since the publication of our article – doing-the-right-thing
matters have taken a turn for the worse with pitch invasions becoming the norm, with ugly scenes being witnessed at other grounds, most notably Goodison Park where Patrick Vieira became involved in a scuffle with an Everton supporter.
The fact that ‘entering the field of play’ remains an offence seems to have gone by the wayside.
Last night, sat around a table in the local public house, it was a subject that dropped into the evening conversation.
With the Football Association set to act, we were discussing what steps could be taken to deter supporters from invading the pitch in their hundreds.
Several views were aired, including fines, banning orders and such like, but in the end, we were unanimous in our views.
We didn’t want to see the return of fencing, the banning of away fans or heavy-handed policing, instead, we thought the best option was to make a public announcement informing the spectators that pitch invasions are illegal and in the event of one there will either be a points deduction (either for the current season or next) or a result reversal!
A bit harsh but something we believed would do the trick!
But what are your views on what is a prickly subject?
Please feel free to have your say in the comment facility beneath this article.
COYH’s
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Gutless F. A. Implimented points deduction for pitch invasion. You have to be kidding me that’s far to sensible. More likely to be a £ 50 fine for the club responsible 😂😂😂😂😂😂
good to see we are one of the few clubs who acted by the rules and allowed the team to do a mini-lap of appreciation with their kids!
Can you imagine? Last game of the season. Luton at home to Forest, winner goes up. Forest fans have bought tickets in the home section. A few minutes to go and they are losing. Hey lads, lets invade the pitch and get Luton points deducted
okay, okay, it has its flaws but I’d hope the Forest fans would have been ejected long before the end and how many would you anticipate getting in the home end when ticket sales are so closely monitored?
Was a shambles on Monday night not 1 copper was looking at the Huddersfield fans they were allowed to get away with the abuse provocation and the throwing of missiles they were fully intent on pepper spraying or nicking any luton fan who dared retaliate as for the stewards why were they even there!! Mind boggles and Huddersfield Town fc are no better no statement or apology offered washing their hands of everything 😡
Absolutely right. Pitch invasion is an offence that should be punished by a points deduction. Yes, we all get more emotional if the result means a finals appearance or safety from relegation but if it was well trailed beforehand that any indiscretion would incur a damaging points deduction – on a sliding scale with an even more severe penalty for assault – for the forthcoming season, many would think twice and thrice. Should anyone offend, identification should be a lot more easy and punishment swift. After all, who wants to be known as the one that ended a club’s season before it has begun??
I am very sorry or all the trouble at the end of the game between Huddersfield and Luton why can I say that I am a Huddersfield fan but I feel a shame for ‘ll the trouble it should never have Happened one these days a player is going to get hurt so very sorry f!or all the Huddersfield town fans that r!an on pitch I did not go on the pitch after the game
Thank you sir
Sir to be fair my info is 50 to 80 Leeds infiltrated your fans an insight Ed the invasion. You can’t legislate for idiots but true Huddersfield fans I’m sure are ashamed of the rest. So your apologies are welcome. Sadly you’re police an stewards were as much to blame for the situation.
cheers Eric, it’s an issue we’ve seen our own fans guilty of on multiple occasions ……………. pot, kettle & black spring to mind from some of our own playing the blame game.
The chucking of flares into the away end versus Oxford being the most recent with York and Brighton incidents not too long ago either.
IF roles were reversed on Monday night and it was us scoring late on at home to Huddersfield some of our own morons would have acted no different to them at full-time, sad but true.
There’s enough cctv about to identify them so banning orders & hefty fines would soon deter others.
Best wishes to Trevor Emery and hope he makes a speedy recovery, i suspect with him coming from a certain generation it will be a case of “stiff upper lip” and business as usual watching the Hatters.
COYH
Danny, I partly agree with you as your fellow Hatter. Certainly, I met Huddersfield fans across the four encounters this season and they were absolutely fine; on the home leg, I belted down from Leeds because I’ve been on a hectic UK music tour which ironically meant coming down by coach with Huddersfield fans who were absolutely brilliant, no animosity towards me at all. Similarly, I had to travel to and from Wembley Arena for the Reading match with Reading fans, who were a bit boisterous, but otherwise fine. My father is the same age as Trevor Emery (let’s hope he recovers soon) and I cannot take him to games because I fear various risks. You’re right to highlight some games where there has been poor behaviour at Kenilworth Road by apparent Luton fans, although I can’t recall instances of opposition players and management being attacked or women encouraging their children to make obscene gestures at away fans at the end of a match. I would disagree with you that fines and bans would be effective deterrents as it seems that empirically these do not deter the unwanted behaviour at grounds. I don’t want to single Huddersfield out but police and stewards in general don’t seem to plan appropriately for the likelihood of the misbehaviour. I think Matty Pearson would also have been disappointed to witness it. To me, it is strange that supposed fans of the winning team embrace victory in such a dysfunctional way; bizarrely, on my music tour, I was in Nottingham on the night of Forest v Sheff Utd, and after the game many apparent Forest fans smashed things up around town despite Forest progressing to the final. I do note that more attention has been paid to the misbehaviour at the City Ground than at The John Smith’s Stadium and I cannot help thinking this is because Luton are somewhat overlooked by the media. In a way, I hope sanctions are not taken against Huddersfield because I see no benefit in that to anybody and we should not want them to detract from properly celebrating their win but I do think their club should publicly apologise to Luton fans and staff just to acknowledge what happened. One of the key aspects for me is that the unwanted behaviour is not entirely spontaneous, some of the miscreants have gone equipped with missiles or taken measures to ensure that they can acquire them at the ground, e.g. retaining bottles for later use.
I see the local Police are now appealing for any phone footage that supporters may have catching idiots at what they do best.
Neal, totally agree with your sentiment about Huddersfield fans being a very decent bunch, no animosity in the pub prior to the game or walking up to the ground, almost a mutual respect for each others club and their ethics, quite a rarity these days.
I think the York City players and fans would quickly remind you about the way our fans attacked them by throwing coins after the final whistle, so we do have previous form for this type of behavior.
Every club seems to have a small minority who can’t behave on these big occasions and as highlighted reguarly in the news drugs particuarly cocaine is now prevalent at football and also other sporting events such as horse racing which i believe goes some way to explaining the charged up irrational behavior of some.
Not sure what the best answer is regarding dealing with pitch invasions but with the ammount of flares going off inside grounds nowadays clearly more thorough body searches are required.
COYH
great sentiments, searching people upon entry needs a drastic improvement, otherwise somebody is going to get hurt with a flare and what else might possibly be smuggled in, a good pat down should be the minimum requirement.
Great big. FINE everytime
unless you put up fences,you will never stop pitch invasions. i would reccomend prison type fence with acess points for stewards and police . any suggestions for the new stadium. just wonder if we are over reacting. the safety of players and officials is paramount. so called fans forget that for players this is there job. any violence against them should not be tolerated. but do you want fences, or is there another option. ? COYH.
Do we really want to have to return to peering through a wire mesh?