Villains by Danny Brown & Paul Brittle

Author:Danny Brown & Paul Brittle [Brown, Danny]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: casuals, football hooligan, hooliganism, aston villa, soccer violence
Publisher: Milo Books Ltd
Published: 2011-05-15T22:00:00+00:00

BRITTLE SHE WORE A CLARET RIBBON IN THE MERRY MONTH OF MAY

Date: 26 May 1982. Venue: Feyenoord Stadium, Rotterdam. Match: European Cup Final. Teams: Aston Villa versus Bayern Munich.

Fourteen years before, we had been on the brink of going out of business. Now here we were, at the very first attempt, playing in a European Cup final against one of the giants of European football. We had to pinch ourselves to prove we were there. Bayern Munich had won the European Cup three times in the mid-Seventies, beating the great Leeds side in 1975, and suddenly my club, who were novices in terms of Europe, were to play them. Nobody was giving us a chance before the game, all the talk was how these seasoned European campaigners would brush aside the English team that had finished only mid-table that season. We had lost our manager and had a caretaker manager in charge who had only ever been an assistant and a scout. The team wasn’t littered with internationals like Bayern. So what chance had we got?

After all the trouble in Brussels in the semi-final, Aston Villa took total control over ticket sales and transport for the final. Nobody was allowed to travel or buy a match ticket other than from the packages the club were organising and they also announced that no supporters would be arriving in Rotterdam until four hours before the kick off, while apologising for the small minority who had spoiled the trips for the vast majority. While that vast majority travelled on the organised trips after being allocated 14,000 tickets for the final, however, the small minority had other ideas.

On the Monday before the game, the ten o’clock ferry from Harwich to the Hook of Holland was packed to the rafters with most of the C Crew who were looking forward to a couple of nights partying in Amsterdam before moving on to Rotterdam for the game on the Wednesday. The crossing took most of the day and the ferry arrived at the Hook around teatime. Ten of our lads had been over since the Saturday and had travelled to Rotterdam on the Monday to sort out tickets.

As the train pulled into the first station, which was Rotterdam West, the ten lads boarded and everyone was pleased to hear that there were loads of tickets and that you could just go up to the ground and buy them. The other thing they told us was that they had had some problems with a load of Moroccans and one of the lads, nicknamed Joe Jordan, had had his head split open with a machete by one of them. He also told us that he knew the club they all used.

As soon as we arrived in Amsterdam, we were shown the club and arranged to meet in the three bars opposite it as soon as we had got digs and ditched our bags. Within an hour, there were 250 C Crew drinking in the three bars. It wasn’t

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