Pitch invasions

[jackal2]

I completely understand the idea of pitch invasions to celebrate with your team.

I actually don't understand the idea of pitch invasions, any more than I understand why a footballer needs to take their shirt off to celebrate a goal. Both are unnecessary actions and both are actually outlawed - one by the law and the other by current footballing rules.

It's perfectly possible to celebrate vociferously with your own team whilst remaining in the stands. In fact, it makes the players less likely to run off the pitch and down the tunnel as soon as possible to avoid being swarmed and possibly injured.

Forty-odd years ago the footballing authorities responded to a major football violence problem with a real crackdown to show that such behaviour wouldn't be tolerated, and it worked. A generation of 70s/80s football hooligans grew old and faded away, and for about 20 years hooliganism became minimal, such that families started coming (back) to football, attendances increased a lot, and security fencing was taken down without any real disorder re-emerging.

Sadly, the spectre of football disorder has been gradually rising again in the past few years and the authorities have been slow to react and stamp it back out. This was apparent to me during the Grimsby home game earlier this season when a large bunch of p*ssed-up, drugged up Burberry knuckleheads were allowed to run amok. The reaction of the police and the football authorities needs to be as ruthless as it was 30 years ago, and that includes zero tolerance of things like pitch invasions, pyrotechnics and substance abuse before games. We haven't reached 70/80s levels of disorder yet by any means, but it will get gradually worse if the fear of God isn't put back into the minds of those who think this is their idea of fun.

Football hooliganism has been crushed before, and with the right no-nonsense approach, it can be crushed again.