Just come across this....

The fighting is unexcuseable but does the reaction of the Arsenal fans to the songs and comments about Eduardo demonstrate that the skins of football supporters are getting thinner by the day?

Some Villa fans got arrested outside the ground coz they were acting up to o.b.

Some Arsenal were arrseted in the ground after a Villa lad in the home section was beaten and ended up at the bottom of the steps in the upper tier after celebrating senderos' own goal. Heard he is in a bad state, apparently skull cracked and everything, police actually closed off a small section of the ground.

And I dont think it was just the song causing the reaction, more Villa fans acting like knobs in addition to the songs, and all stewards seem to do is throw arsenal out when reacting. There's this sort of code at Arsenal now where Away fans can do as they please, but if its Arsenal then..

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/main.jhtm...2/sfnars102.xml

Total over reaction, what do Arsenal fans expect? You would of thought he died last week from all the media attention it has attracted and now this

To be honest the eduardo chants were to be expected and i don't know why some of the arsenal fans got so angry about them.

It was just the general attitude of villa fans throughout the day. I saw loads of villa fans outside the ground intimidating families with young children, and people who werent even going to the game. They were spoiling for a fight all day, add to the fact the hail of coins and bottles that were thrown over from them after the game.

Then all we here is a few of their fans were arrested and injured or ran into a few arsenal who werent gona turn the other cheek and suddenly their the victims. The bloke who got injured in the home end, hope he recovers but if your gona sit in the home end have your wits about you

The chants will be done every week now, afterall football fans choose the song to most offend and wind up the other team. We are main culprits as well probly !!!

bloody hell.... I thought that song was pretty funny. I don't want to see that happen to any footballer even a gooner but the song ain't that bad, its football!

seems people are listening to wenger moaning about how they are vindicated and still emotionally scarred a bit too much and taking it to heart..

Bloody hell, sounded like that Villa fan got beaten to a pulp..

And i agree, football fans always sing songs like this. Not really a big deal. I remember going to Villa Park shortly after Dublin left us for them and broke his neck and we sang "Dublin went to Villa and he broke his neck..."

'Eduardo wooah
Eduardo wooah
He did have silky skills
Now he walks like Heather Mills' :lol: Anyone would think he's dead the fuss thats been made.

And as for our fans picking on families?! It went off after the game, our lads and their lads and ours ran them all over the place, i'm not a hooligan but it definitely wasn't families that were running off

Whatever the truth of the matter, none of the above sounds good at all...

In my humble - and I'm sure you'd agree - while a fan in the wrong end should keep his/her mouth shut if they don't, they shouldn't be on the receiving end of a beating.

These sort of incidents will have knock on effects for all of us.

When we got beat by Villa recently they were singing songs about us going down while walking out and were obviously spoiling for a fight.

What’s wrong with the Midlands? B’ham attack innocent fans, Wolves attack supporters at random and chuck missiles at women and kids and Coventry is full of chavs who left 10 mins early to wait for us outside.

It’s like an episode of Life on Mars whenever I go there; it really is like travelling back in time.

I like West Brom though, we chatted to their fans walking to the ground and had friendly banter inside, plus Adrian Chiles supports them.
It did threaten to turn nasty after the game though as there was a potentially dangerous snowball fight.

yeh we are the least violent out of the midland clubs, but when it comes to us vs them we do have a large number who are up for it and give as good as we get, but against others we dont do anything and not many par the youth will travel

Can we keep this thread to observations of what people actually experience at games please?

I don't really want to discussion on which club had the bigger firm and who is the most violent. Not the idea of the forum and not overly helpful either.

I'm struggling to moderate the forum and keep it balanced but I am concerned that several people have contacted me to say that they are put off using it as they seem to think that all we talk about is trouble at grounds and that there is a tendency to glorify trouble at games...

still they know the risk if they go into someone else's end and tbh most people aren't stupid enough to do so, but for those who do shouldn't be so stupid you know what could happen.

this aint about hooliganism its about stupidity

It's not about hooliganism or stupidity, it's about campaigning to have standing areas brought into football grounds in our country.
The only way that is ever going to happen is if this campaign really takes off, for it to take off new members who are supportive of the objectives of the campaign need to see a way in which they can contribute to it being a success.

Every thread must be somehow related to pushing the campaign a little bit foward...

Good examples of where this has happened.....
Where a section of the media recognises a want for standing areas, a link is posted of an email to that part of the media, everyone then emails it in support.

EDM

New website

Protests

Not....
Man U fans were amazing again, this time against Fulham.

or Somebody got beat up at a game.

While I feel sorry for whoever the innocent party was this forum has turned into likeminded fans discussing football issues.

Am I the only one who sees such a great opportunity for the campaign to succeed but feels it is standing still (If not moving backwards) due to the above??!!

Well IMO trouble seems to come more often to teams that stand and teams who have most fans on this board. Whether thats just me i dont know but we have leeds, coventry, swansea, scum, villa, millwall, west ham...all have abit of a reputation and stand more often than not and have fans on here. If trouble happens when we are at the game we will mention it more often than not simply because its a matchday experience

It's very sad to hear of a fan being beaten up purely for celebrating a goal in the home end. Don't get me wrong, he shouldn't have been there, and he should've shown some respect and kept quiet and once he celebrated he should have been removed, but really what the hell goes on in someones minds that they would beat someone up for supporting a different football team is totally beyond me.

Secondly, I was really annoyed with the total over the top, melodramatic, primadonna reaction of the media to Eduardo's injury. I dunno whether it's because Eduardo is a golden boy at the London media darlings club of Arsenal, but it was as if it was the end of the world. He broke his leg, sh1t happens, get over it.

Worse things happen at sea, in fact worse things happen on rugby pitches most weekends. It was a very bad injury, and newsworthy, but I'm fed up with the overreaction of football fans, players, managers and the media to it all.

Football is becoming an embarrasingly poncey game to be a fan of.

Well this thread is tittled 'Villa fans arrested at Emirates', so I gave reasons why certain fans were arrested, and reasons behind the actions of others.

Also it wasnt just for celebrating, it was celebrating + not being able to keep his mouth shut after.

No, i'm sure you're not. But there is a lot of talk here about people being put off using these forums due to talk of this and that. Nothing puts me off forums more than overly eager modding. Chalky - you said every thread must be campaign related etc. That is a little OTT. There are different sections here for on / off topic subjects and all that's required is a little tidying every now and again to keep it neat. However, you cannot control the content of forums. It's plain daft to even try. While these forums have a set criteria (safe standing) they are still football related and populated by match going fans. There is going to be much football related conversation which does not relate to the campaign. This is perfectly acceptable and while i can appreciate amanda's reasons for pulling people up if she feels they are gloryfying violence / hooliganism, the posts which are simply off topic (eg. "i've just got back from the match pissed and i saw you there. it was great wasn't it?" etc) don't need immediate, sarcastic wrist slapping. That sort of thing always puts me off forums. As a newcomer, your first impression is, well it's not much fun here is it. If someone posts off topic a gentle PM should suffice or just move the topic. There's no need for public tellings off.

Exactly, I dont agree with anyone gloryifying hooliganism on here, but if we get to a point were anything other than SUSD related material isnt allowed to be posted then the board will dry up very quickly, minus the standing watch at the top if people are still here to contribute.

Aslong as the main topic is sensible and related in some way, it should be okay if it strays abit off topic after the point has been made.

I welcome your opinions on this...

Keep 'em coming and I'll be back later on to comment.

I'm one of the most anti-violent people there are - I won't even eat meat because I can't bear the thought of the violence that the animal may have suffered.

But I also think that going into the wrong end at football and celebrating when your team scores is absolutely criminal. It's completely disrespectful to those around you, and chances are that Arsenal sold out their home allocation and that you're denying a genuine gooner a seat. Quite frankly, although I would never condone violence at football, I think he should have known better and pretty much had it coming.

I very must doubt that he was beaten up without having given the home fans a bit of lip too.

I think that beating him up was wrong, but I certainly don't have any sympathy for him.

[QUOTE=marvin,Mar 3 2008, 04:39 PM] [QUOTE=chalky,Mar 3 2008, 04:08 PM] As a newcomer, your first impression is, well it's not much fun here is it. [/QUOTE]
I don't think that the intention of the SUSD campaign and forum was ever for "fun". I'm just getting very frustrated that I still can't guarentee I will be able to stand up when I go to a football match so when we aren't helping ourselves by keeping discussion campaign related I feel this campaign isn't going to take off and I'll never get the choice of standing.

No you aren't if there are people being put off from posting completely and others who don't feel that the campaign is moving forward.

A lot of the stuff on here is quite relevant even if not directly related to the campaign. But there's a lot which isn't e.g. "I haven't managed to get a ticket for the game v so and so", "our support is louder/better/bigger than yours", etc. This is the kind of tench that shouldn't be on but on the other hand if it's banned it might stop some people from posting who also contribute positively. It's a difficult one. But there's also other stuff which is potentially damaging to the campaign. Not in favour of draconian moderation but could there be a reminder to ask people to think before they post whether it might be damaging to the cause?

There is a lot of good work going on it seems but it would also be useful to know the overall strategy and direction of the campaign, where do members need to concentrate their efforts?

All the campaign matters should be discussed on these forum, but also its a brillant site to discuss all football matters, this can be done in the 'on the pitch' forum. Both can be discussed

Whilst the primary reason I use this website is to support the Safe Standing campaign, I also see it as a nice place to engage in gentle banter and football-related conversations with fans of teams other than Tottenham (whom I wouldn't otherwise speak to if I restricted myself to Tottenham boards). I'd use it less if that weren't the case.

exactly! - not supposed to be fun? well if it was 100% nothing but news about safe standing i'd soon stop coming because how often is there a significant bit of news (even with lots of people working hard towards it)? - once every month if that? why then would people come here every day?! The idea of exclusively campaign related boards is absolutely barking!
Cityman - posts like "i didn't get a ticket for the match" aren't harmful to the campaign one iota and i don't see a problem with people discussing stuff like that if it's kept to the appropriate section of the forum ("on the pitch" in this case). If people occasionally (and it isn't that often) post in the wrong section (probably because they've just got back from the match and are a few pints to the good) then just deal with it sensibly (ie. PM them and / or move the post / thread).

marvin, read my post again, I never said they were.

I suppose "all other football matters" covers everything, just that I find it very tedious seeing tickets stuff like that, and I know I'm not the only one - don't see why fans can't use their own team's messageboards or use pms to each other. But that's a minor thing really. As I said it might stop some people coming on here altogether if mods come down hard.

Any posts which do harm the campaign e.g. excuse violence, should be removed

I wouldn't be in favour of this. I quite like seeing what goes on at other clubs (United seem to have the biggest following on this board, but there have also been specific threads about Liverpool, Chelsea, Swansea, etc on the board in the past), and occasionally I'll see something that I can contribute to, even though it's not my team.

i heard villa fans walked out of the ground and were all limping, dunno how true that is though

i fully agree anything actually harmful such as condoning violence should be clamped down on but the general, mindless football chat is as much part of the forums as is the campaign stuff. People at work in a cardboard box factory talk about other things throughout the course of their day than cardboard boxes. These forums would be unbelievably dull if they were restricted to campaign only related stuff. As for keeping that kind of talk to our own teams' forums - i can only speak for us but i've yet to see a united themed board worth going on. This is the only forum i bother to look at and at least half the reason i check it / post every day is because of the "other" stuff. Safe standing brought me here but the whole balanced package is what keeps me coming back.

That's fair enough, and the good thing about these forums is that there is such a variety of opinion

suppose it's all a balance really - I'm here more for the campaigning stuff and don't bother too much with the rest, others may be the opposite and others fairly equal with both

I share chalky's frustration though and just feel that there ought to be more emphasis on the campaigning and whilst there is a lot happening, the perception sometimes is that nothing is moving on

i'd agree but i don't think that perception is caused by the non-campaign related discussions on these forums. It's caused by a lack of stuff going on. It's not as though if everybody stopped talking about anything else tomorrow the boards would be flooded with campaign talk. The progress is of a slow and steady nature. i might agree that there is more we all could be doing but we're not being stopped from doing any of it because people on here like to talk about football in general.

Don't want to do this to death or people will be complaining that we're boring them :D but there must be a problem if Amanda says that there are people being put off by certain (agree, not all) non-campaign related discussions.

It would be good to get people to post who feel this way and be specific about why, this has been tried before I think but no harm trying it again, and asking them what changes could be made so that they will post

The diversity of the team as created a diverse following. This is added to the extreme left wing policy at your club.

I there no are old school black, turk, greek, itialian, and indians guys who support, arsenal they no the score.

it the post 1995 that need sorting out.

new song for arsenal

WHO LET THE VOGS OUT UGH UGH UGH


NEXT SONG YOU WILL HEAR WHEN WE MEET.