I was talking recently with a friend who lives in London and is a huge Arsenal supporter (and author of books about French poets) and asked about the hooligans at matches. It doesn’t exist really any more, he said: the teams have priced the tickets high and those guys can’t afford to go to games anymore.
Interesting! I wondered about that too— why this behavior to me seems like it has decreased dramatically. In the Buford book, a lot of these fans don’t even get tickets— so it seems like even though ticket prices must be a factor increased security and modernized stadiums must have helped. Anecdotally it feels like the sport has kind of been gentrified— which makes sense to your point about ticket prices increasing for people actually buying tickets. I think the policing generally has intensified (CCTV!!) and bans which were just starting to be instituted got more strict. That being said…when you google around about hooligan behavior at matches incidents still pop up in Europe and elsewhere and seems to be on the rise again. I’d love Buford to revisit!
We're in the UK now and staying about 2 miles from the Arsenal stadium. The Gunners just won the Premier League for the first time in 22 years so all we're seeing are fans kitted up in red & white with giant shit-eating grins roaming around! Have always wanted to read Thugs though (as well as the Nick Hornby football book), so thanks for the reminder!
I was talking recently with a friend who lives in London and is a huge Arsenal supporter (and author of books about French poets) and asked about the hooligans at matches. It doesn’t exist really any more, he said: the teams have priced the tickets high and those guys can’t afford to go to games anymore.
Interesting! I wondered about that too— why this behavior to me seems like it has decreased dramatically. In the Buford book, a lot of these fans don’t even get tickets— so it seems like even though ticket prices must be a factor increased security and modernized stadiums must have helped. Anecdotally it feels like the sport has kind of been gentrified— which makes sense to your point about ticket prices increasing for people actually buying tickets. I think the policing generally has intensified (CCTV!!) and bans which were just starting to be instituted got more strict. That being said…when you google around about hooligan behavior at matches incidents still pop up in Europe and elsewhere and seems to be on the rise again. I’d love Buford to revisit!
We're in the UK now and staying about 2 miles from the Arsenal stadium. The Gunners just won the Premier League for the first time in 22 years so all we're seeing are fans kitted up in red & white with giant shit-eating grins roaming around! Have always wanted to read Thugs though (as well as the Nick Hornby football book), so thanks for the reminder!
How wonderful!! Enjoy your visit. I should read Fever Pitch next— it seems like it would be a good companion to Among the Thugs.
ahhh terrifying & fascinating. also lol at the Eagles callout 😭
So terrifying. I need to read something calming next.