A football fan who pushed a passenger on to a Tube track has been jailed for 10 years, Sky News reported. As we delve into the subject matter, there are two main questions to ask: was this incident simply a reminder of english hooliganism of the past or a sign that it is still alive and kicking?
What happened?
But first of all, what exactly happened? The Independent reported that the man was an English football fan (Christopher Cole) and pushed a Polish builder onto the tracks 34 seconds before a train arrived. Cole was apparently angry at the behaviour of Russian fans' during Euro 2016.
Afterwards he got drunk and picked an argument with David Pietraskzek, after mistaking him as being Russian. The victim was "badly bruised" but managed to "leap out of the way" seconds ahead of the oncoming train.
A look to the past and today
As we look to answer the questions posed, let us go back to a time when English hooliganism was at its worst during the 1980s. Four Four Two magazine noted that 1985 was "utterly disastrous". From the low points of the Luton Town riot, the Valley Parade fire and the Heysel disaster, 1985 was described as being "among the most miserable ever experienced in the national game". But how is it today? On the whole it seems that the hooliganism of the 1980s are behind us.
The Guardian revealed that the 2011-12 English football season had the lowest total of "football-related arrests" on record. In Europe, as stated in a home office report, "more than 100,000 English and Welsh clubs travelled to Champions League and Europa League matches outside of England and Wales...these 44 matches resulted in just twenty arrests of away fans".
However, despite such progress, hooliganism is not totally out of our system. The same report noted that the number of arrests had gone up by 4 percent in 2012-13. The Guardian also noted trouble at Euro 2016 in France last summer between fans of Russia and England "in the old port area in the hours before the match".
On the decline
Overall I think that in the past few years it seems that fan clashes involving England supporters is on the decline. First of all to note that at Euro 16 it was the "Russian ultras" who attacked the English and caused "havoc all over the city", the Telegraph newspaper noted. It is on the decline mainly due to a combination of "tougher laws" and a higher chance of "detection".
So is the incident that took place on the Tube track simply a reminder of the past or an illustration that hooliganism is still alive? I think the former. It looks like an isolated incident. Hooliganism generally involved large numbers of people fighting each other. I do also believe that there is a lot more respect in the English game and, although not nice to see, I view what happened more as a reminder than an indication of something larger.
