FOOTBALL ON TRIAL Spectator violence and development in the football world potx

[...]... might have been the intention of some of them to fight only defensively and not to initiate attacks Their interest in football, in other words, might have been greater than their interest in fighting In England, especially since the mid-1960s, a certain kind of person has been attracted to football primarily because they see it as an attractive context in which to fight In a football context, a readymade... when one’s team looks close to scoring and elation when they do; fear when the opponents threaten to score and disappointment when they succeed During a closely fought match, the spectators flit constantly from one feeling-state to another until the issue has finally been decided Then, the supporters of the winning side experience triumph and jubilation, those of the losers dejection and despair If the. .. challenge for the Football Trust, the Football Grounds Improvement Trust and other bodies to meet the demands of clubs and their fans for safer, more comfortable spectator facilities On the international stage, the promise of Italy and the feast of entertainment which is in prospect will bring together once again, via television and live attendance, hundreds of millions of spectators in celebration of a... developed in the ‘first industrial nation’, Britain, and sports such as gridiron football, which developed in the principal ‘second-wave’ industrial country, the USA The media-supported idea that American sports are entirely free from spectator violence is perhaps an important weapon on their side.29 15 FOOTBALL ON TRIAL It is again too early to predict what the outcome of this competition is going to be Since... may be the fact that gridiron football seems to have increased in popularity precisely when the United States was at the height of its de-civilizing involvement in the Vietnam War.35 We are thinking in this connection, not only of the death, injury and brutalization of so many American conscripts in Vietnam and the ramifications of this brutalization when they got back home but also of the consequences... serves as a means of enhancing their prestige among their peers—or whether they are involved in disturbances at football for politically motivated reasons In England, again since the mid-1960s, both these forms of football hooliganism—they are often closely interrelated—have become increasingly common In fact, one can say that they constitute the currently dominant forms of English football hooligan behaviour... leading to the emergence of new focuses of competition and conflict, or perhaps just contributing to the intensification of lines of cleavage that have already been in evidence for some time As far as soccer is concerned, it may be that these processes, coupled with the growing influence of multinational companies in the finance of European clubs and the overtones of television, are creating the conditions... integration consists of the fact that soccer hooliganism is beginning to become an increasingly European problem rather than one restricted simply to particular nations We are thinking in this connection not only of the growing numbers of continentals who are beginning to ape the English and engage in hooliganism abroad but also of the evidence that there are definite, albeit currently small, linkages... potential conflict at any football match Such conflict is likely to be most intense when and where one of the following conditions or a combination of them holds More particularly, intense conflict in connection with a football match is more likely when and where: (1) the teams represent groups that are in some kind of serious conflict with each other in the wider society; (2) the rival supporters are strongly... its replacement by the 4–2–4 and 4–3–3 systems We have also seen the ‘push and run’ and the ‘long ball’ games, the use of ‘sweepers’ and ‘liberos’, to say nothing of the concept of ‘total football which is said to have originated in the Netherlands in the 1970s The tactical evolution of football and the merits of different ways of organizing the disposition of players on the field are subjects that . a considerable and convincing achievement. Nor is this collection concerned only with issues of violence and indiscipline on and off the field of play, though that is its main organizing theme player indiscipline and violence, the social history of spectator hooliganism in Britain, and the part played by the mass media in the generation of the latter. There is a degree of overlap and repetition in. seen the ‘push and run’ and the ‘long ball’ games, the use of ‘sweepers’ and ‘liberos’, to say nothing of the concept of ‘total football which is said to have originated in the Netherlands in the