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Not so at football matches mick,if you watch on tv you see the ground half empty 15 mins before kick off,the pubs surrounding the stadiums are full,then they all cram in with mins to go,its a wonder there hasnt been alot more tragedies.

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You state that you have no sympathy for the people who were killed at Hillsborough, Chillwell wardy (#5/7). Do the dead not count for anything because their own supporters, in your words, 'arrived lat

The police government & the media all colluded in a cover up of malpractice at Hillsborough. None of these organisations can be trusted.

Paid my respects in the Old Market Square at three today. There was a good turnout with many doing likewise. God bless the 96.

Scouse so called supporters arrived late from pub and tried to blagg their way Into Hillsborough without. Tickets (as usual ) and crushed their own supporters that had arrived early to watch a game of football.No sympathy.

Chillwell wardy

I notice your two posts(nearly the same) are your first on this forum I hope they are your last.

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One question remains in my mind.

Why did so many fans arrive so late, where had they been until just before kick off.

In those public events that I attend, and that does not include football matches, I always ensure I am early to get my seat.

Firstly Mick, if you watch the video I posted you'll see that the crowd outside was already there at 2.33. A couple of things conspired such that a few thousand fans arrived around that time. Firstly, in 1988 there were 3 trains chartered for a Sheffield fixture, that year only 1 was made available, so there were higher numbers using coaches. There were unannounced road works on the M62 so many of these coaches were delayed. As soon as it was realised that there would be many fans arriving after 2.30 a police officer asked for the game to be delayed by 15 mins as had happened 2 years earlier but this was refused. In fact, it has been calculated that with the small number of turnstiles it would have taken until 40 minutes into the game for everyone to get into the ground. IMHO arriving 30 minutes before a game is not 'late'. I generally leave the pub at Anfield with about 10 minutes to go and walk straight through a turnstile. The police immediately blamed drunk, late, ticketless fans and all 3 of these aspects have been shown to be lies. In particular, those who travelled by coach didn't have time for a pint before the match and the pubs were, in fact, fuller with Forest fans as the game approached according to the evidence given at the Taylor inquiry. Forest fans could walk straight into the ground at the last minute as they had enough turnstiles so a crowd didn't build up outside in the same way.

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  • 2 months later...

Hillsborough Ride For The 96. Bikes stolen at Anfield!

Six Irishmen visiting Merseyside for a charity cycle ride in memory of the Hillsborough victims have had their bikes stolen outside Anfield. Merseyside Police said five bikes were stolen from a van parked near the ground while the group were on a tour of Liverpool FC's stadium on Saturday.

I think the scousers will find and sort these boys out?

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  • 9 months later...

Thanks for posting that. It's great that even Duckenfield (the policeman in charge) has now admitted to lying about the gate being forced and that he froze when the tragedy unfolded. Finaly the inquest is forcing the truth out of some of the people who've maintained their lies all these years.

Meanwhile, on a footballing tragedy note, astonishing news that the Bradford fire that killed 56 football fans was one of 9 fires at businesses owned by the then Bradford chariman Stafford Heginbotham. Apparently, the day before he had been told it would cost £2million to bring the ground up to standard, adding to his money troubles.

"The pattern began with a fire at a three-storey Bradford factory in May 1967 and continued on Good Friday 1968 with another fire at the premises of Genefoam, of which Heginbotham was the managing director. A firm Heginbotham had founded suffered a serious fire in 1970 before the Castle Mills building, owned by Heginbotham, had a fire in 1971. Further blazes followed at the Douglas Mills building, also owned by Heginbotham, in August and November 1977. In December that year there was a fire at the premises of Coronet Marketing, a subsidiary of Heginbotham’s Tebro Toys. A further fire at the Douglas Mills building occurred in June 1981."

http://www.theguardian.com/football/2015/apr/15/bradford-fire-stafford-heginbotham-martin-fletcher

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  • 1 year later...

Never been much of a 'footy' fan, but I originate from Nottm, am married to a 'Scouser' and have heard heated comments from all sides.

All I can say is that whatever (some) Liverpool fans did on that day was not exceptional, was most certainly predictable and could well have been done by fans of any club in similar circumstances. I'm also told that many were delayed on the Motorway. It is therefore clear that the faults in managing the situation lay entirely at the door of the Police, whose job it was to manage the situation.

There were opportunities to delay the kick off, and to inform waiting fans of this, to relieve the 'urgency'. They were not taken up.

The rest doesn't need repeating again.

The week after the tragedy, I did a Careers Guidance interview with the daughter of one of the victims. I was impressed by her dignity and fortitude.

The fans have been proven innocent.

The guilty have yet to be brought to account.

Sitting here just outside Liverpool, I'm really pleased to read that most sensible Nottm people can see through the mindless Tabloid hate to what really took place.

Col

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I don't blame the tabloid's as much as the police who fed them misinformation at the time. Going back in time we used to trust the police much more than now and their account was taken on face value.

At least the chief copper who tried to keep up the charade has now been suspended.

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  • 11 months later...
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Ironic really, one of my workmates would have been there if I had not dragged him out of bed to do a bit of overtime at 'cappa pass ' in Hull!!

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  • 11 months later...

Despite the outcry of the public and the relatives of the deceased and injured spectators I have never been convinced that the fault rested with the police force attending to control the crowds that day. In my opinion as follows is my perception of the main causal effects of this major incident,

 

1. First, the stadium venue was far too small for the expected crowds of spectators. Poor planning and no risk assessment carried out.

 

2. Access was severely limited to allow that vast number of spectators through the turnstiles in a safe and controlled manner.

 

3. It appeared to me that there were crowds of spectators without tickets purposely there to gain access access by climbing over the walls into the  narrow passageways onto the terraces. These mass intrusions led to to the surges of spectators who intended to get in free that was the main cause of the catastrophe.

 

4. I saw no apparent controls being put into place during the wall invasion by the the ground staff.

 

5. It was not the fault of the under-staffed police force to manage the volume of spectators. nor were they trained in crowd management.

 

6. The police were there to protect the safety of the public, not to act as assistant ground staff and gate controllers. This was the role of the stadium management.

 

7. Spectators were injured mainly due to the uncontrolled surge by young non-ticket holders over the wall and subsequently by the wire fence that had been erected to prevent uncontrolled entry onto the football pitch.

 

8. Wire fences were erected to prevent spectators getting onto the pitch. Younger spectators had a reputation arising from past behaviour for rowdyism. 

 

If football spectators behaved in a decent and considerate manner crowd control fences would have been unnecessary and would have eliminated the crushing event that occurred as a result of the crowd surge. 

 

Who then is to blame?. The venue planners for poor if not negligent event planning and the assessment of the venue and the volume of spectators prediction. The spectators (mainly non-ticket holders') gaining illegal entry into the stadium causing . Failure of the stadium planning staff and management to ensure sufficient crowd control personnel were prepared and trained. Poor design of pitch invasion prevention measures. The police were erroneously given the role of stadium crowd controllers for which they were apparently untrained. 

All these singular and combined causal factors led to the incipient catastrophe. The rot starts with the venue planners.   

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5 hours ago, Alpha said:

 

 

3. It appeared to me that there were crowds of spectators without tickets purposely there to gain access access by climbing over the walls into the  narrow passageways onto the terraces. These mass intrusions led to to the surges of spectators who intended to get in free that was the main cause of the catastrophe.

 

I knew an avid Liverpool supporter,  from Scouseland, who regularly boasted of how they would get into games without tickets. As Alpha said, blame lay with more than the police but, I believe, the poor souls that did perish were innocent victims who had been in the ground well before KO and were at the front near the wire fence. Sad day in football history. And don't forget, Liverpool have history...Heysel?

When I read the first comment that it was 32 years ago, I thought 'what! where do the years go!'

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32 Years ago, where did that time go, RIP for so many lives taken for just attending a game of football and no doubt led to the all seating stadiums we have today.

Many years ago when as a youth in the Trent End was lifted off my feet by the surge of fans and shifted forward towards the goals. I wonder how many were bruised or hurt by those crush barriers that were installed at regular intervals on the terraces. As I grew older and wiser I transferred my viewpoint to the 18 yard line towards the Trent end in the old east stand and always took care to stand on the downhill side of a crush barrier for protection.

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