After a stadium brawl in France left dozens injured, authorities were on high alert for more violence in Marseille around the Champions League encounter with Eintracht Frankfurt on Tuesday.
Violent elements from both clubs got into fan clashes last season, and vigilance was ratcheted up in France following last Thursday’s mass brawl between ultras from Nice and Cologne before a Europa Conference League game.
Police said five arrests were made on Monday night when large groups from Frankfurt and Marseille were prevented from confronting each other. Dozens of police vans were stationed around the city’s Old Port area. Frankfurt’s group was then held for several hours outside its hotel, surrounded by police.
Frankfurt has a ticket allocation of 3,300 for Tuesday’s game at Stade Velodrome but authorities anticipate around 8,000 German supporters could arrive during the day, including a violent element of up to 300. Last week, 15,000 Cologne fans travelled to Nice.
The violent clashes inside Nice’s stadium between the ultras led to 32 injuries, one of them serious after an ultra fell from the stands.
Marseille midfielder Mattéo Guendouzi called for calm.
“I hope there won’t be any disorder like we saw when Nice played Cologne,” he told France 3 television. “It’s a party for everyone and I hope there will be a great atmosphere in the stadium.”
Away supporters from Frankfurt have been told not to wear any club colors around the city before the game and a prefectural decree was put in place to exclude Frankfurt fans from four of the city’s busiest districts. Alcohol sales were partially banned from 2 p.m. Tuesday until the game’s kickoff at 9 p.m. Frankfurt fans were to travel from a set meeting point to the stadium under police escort.
PREVIOUS PROBLEMS
However, similar measures failed to prevent huge brawls outside Stade Velodrome when Dutch club Feyenoord visited Marseille last season, because hundreds of Feyenoord hooligans travelled without tickets with the specific intention of fighting. They did not chant or wear any club colors and gathered in big numbers.
Marseille’s Old Port area is accustomed to soccer violence.
It was the scene of rampaging battles when Russian hooligans attacked English fans drinking around its many cafes at the European Championship in 2016, in scenes resembling fights between English hooligans and local gangs from Marseille during the 1998 World Cup.
With its myriad of side streets and alleyways that peel away from the port to the stadium itself, Marseille is very difficult to police.
“Regularly, when there are football matches, some Marseille fans try to detect the presence of opposing fans in order to confront them,” Marseille’s police prefecture said this week.
Clashes can happen the night before the game itself, when there are less police. Marseille ultras fought violently with counterparts from Lazio late at night in 2018, and did so last season against fans of Feyenoord and Greek side PAOK Thessaloniki.
A match was halted at Stade Velodrome last September after fans clashed when Marseille played Turkish club Galatasaray.
In April, Greek ultras from PAOK numbering around 200 managed to arrive in coaches despite agreed restrictive measures such as police checkpoints.
PAOK clashed with Marseille’s ultras and the police the day before the game and inside the stadium. Local ultras even tried attacking PAOK’s ultras at their hotel, with riot police blocking the doors to prevent PAOK from coming out.
The violence in Marseille continued in May when Feyenoord came for the Europa Conference League semifinal return leg, some hooligans arriving two days before. Their hooligan group, among the most violent in Europe, numbered 400.
Before that game, they fought Marseille’s ultras outside the stadium several times. Marseille groups then attacked riot police afterward, as they did after the Galatasaray match, in an attempt to reach ultras held back inside the stadium by police.
FRANKFURT TROUBLE
Frankfurt’s hooligan element, known as “Brigade Nassau,” has long been active and clashed with rivals from Polish club Lech Poznan in what appeared to be a pre-arranged meet on Aug. 24. Poznan’s hooligan element stopped off in Germany on the way to a game in Luxembourg against Dudelange.
Frankfurt’s hooligans have previously brawled with established hooligan groups like Zenit St. Petersburg’s “Music Hall” in pre-arranged fights or been involved in forest fights with rivals from Cologne and other German groups.
Before last season’s Europa League semifinal, there were violent clashes around Frankfurt train station with supporters from London club West Ham.
The Spanish city of Sevilla witnessed violent scenes around the final as some 300 cagoul-wearing ultras/hooligans from Frankfurt attacked fans from Scottish club Rangers in Sevilla as the season ended amid a wave of fan violence that threatens to escalate again this season.
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