West Ham vs Millwall warzone

[Xx-Vicky-xX]

Ok i can't find a decent news report about it to post but i figured we should have a topic on it so if anyone can find the reports do post them.

My brother was there as he has a season ticket for West Ham, he actually loved it bless him :eek:

[parkerman]

What he loved someone getting knifed and ending up in hospital!!!? :eek:

[Katy]

These people clearly thought they were in Green Street or something.

I'm disapointed with it as i thought we were getting better with football. I think it could affect Englands chances at getting the World Cup.

I love football and have been a season ticket holder at Man City for three years and travelled home and away since at uni and i never experienced any trouble like that, there has been the odd punch up but nothing that bad.

[lizann]

Who won? :rolleyes:

[GossipGirl]

I am not surprised :(
Shame that people got hurt!
It turned into a mini war and not about football

[tammyy2j]

For a time at Upton Park last night it was as if football had been transported back to the 1980s, as supporters of West Ham United and Millwall re-enacted a time when the match was only a backdrop to rioting.

A 44-year-old man was in a stable condition after being stabbed in the chest during violence that flared before, during and after the Carling Cup second-round tie that West Ham won 3-1 after extra time. The FA is likely to launch an immediate inquiry.

Fans ran riot in the streets around the ground, throwing bottles, bricks, ripping up bollards and starting fires. Inside the stadium, rival fans fought with each other and police, while a number of pitch invasions took place.

“I’ve never seen anything like that before after seven years with Chelsea and 11 months with West Ham,” Gianfranco Zola, the West Ham manager, said. “I’m sure there will be inquiries and they will try to look at the situation. I was completely shocked.

“It’s certainly not good for football. I knew it was a game that meant a lot for the two sets of supporters, but I didn’t imagine it like this.

“What can I say? I’m a sport man. I love the game. I love to go on the pitch and try and make it exciting for the supporters and enjoyable for everybody to watch. I’m disappointed. You don’t want to see these scenes.”

Carlton Cole, the West Ham striker, was substituted after allegedly being subjected to monkey chants, although Zola denied that was his motivation for taking him off. “I didn’t know he was abused by the supporters,” he said.

Kenny Jackett, the Millwall manager, was keen to play down the trouble. “I didn’t fear for my own safety,” he said. “There were no Millwall fans on the pitch. They stayed where they were supposed to. There were a lot of people on the pitch. The lads gathered together and came to the sides, as they should have. That was the right thing to do.

“We’ve got a passionate game in this country, but when it oversteps the mark then things have to be done.”

But while modern-day football, particularly in the Barclays Premier League, happily portrays a corporate family-friendly image, some who have found themselves excluded by high prices have found a nostalgia for the old days of crumbling stadiums and fan violence.

Indeed hooligan gangs at both clubs have been the subject of movies in recent years — Green Street, starring Elijah Wood, focused on a West Ham gang, while The Football Factory, starring Danny Dyer, featured Millwall hooligans.

West Ham and Millwall have seldom been in the same division in recent years, but the hooligan fringe among both clubs’ supporters regard the other as their fiercest rivals, which stretches back to the days when the clubs were formed by rival shipbuilding firms at docks on the Isle of Dogs in East London.

The more modern-day hatred goes back to two incidents in the Seventies. The first was a testimonial match in 1972 at the Den for Harry Cripps, a Millwall defender, between the clubs, when opposing hooligans fought outside and inside the ground, and an incident four years later when a Millwall fan died at New Cross station after a scuffle with West Ham fans that saw him fall from a train.

An FA spokesman said anyone involved in last night’s troubles would be banned from football for life. “We absolutely condemn all of the disorder that has occurred at Upton Park both inside and outside of the ground,” the spokesman said. “We will be working with all parties, including the police and clubs, to establish the facts. We strongly expect all culprits to be banned from football for life.”

One Millwall fan described scenes outside the stadium as “like a war zone”. He said: “I brought my kids with me tonight and they’ve seen some violence that is indescribable.”

:eek: this runins the game for the other fans and players and club :thumbsdow

[Xx-Vicky-xX]

What he loved someone getting knifed and ending up in hospital!!!? :eek:

No he loved the atmosphere (as in the crowds chanting really loudly at eachother and all the crazyness