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The Safety of Fans in the North Stand


bat said:
“creating a shitstorm for themselves”
Why? How?
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tunstallhill said:
its already been pointed out, that 'incidents' are down 60% since the move. i'd say 80% of home fans don't even come into contact with the away fans now outside the ground. all fans heading towards the town and roker avenue way - the vast majority - have zero interaction other than with the odd couple of away fans walking the same way. certainly nowhere near like the old days behind the south stand, used to be hell on regularly, leeds, liverpool man united etc.. was always a massive police operation.

so, a couple of games in after the away fans have been moved to the east stand, and all these familie with kids etc.. and old people who have never had any doings with the away fans, suddenly are faced with 1000, 2000, 3000 away fans in a massive group right outside the east stand, every single game... then one or two little flashpoints inevitably occur, and within a couple of months theres complaints flying into the club about the trouble outside the ground, where there hasn't been any for past 10 years.

also, its almost as easy to throw a bottle or a flair sideways as it is to throw it forwards, depends where the thrower is located in the away end. so why do people think that the problem will magically go away if they are downstairs?

and thats before the problem of shifting 5000 home fans and blocking off a massive chunk of the lower bowl and all the logistics that go around that.

so aye, creating a shitstorm for themselves. why not just try and solve the actual problem, instead of moving it and creating several other problems in the process
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“it creates more problems than it solves, thats all i'm saying”
You keep saying this sort of stuff but you don’t give one iota of what these problems would be. I appreciate you are not in favour of moving away fans. But your vehement argument against is so strong but I would, genuinely, would change my mind if you provide alternatives that make more sense.
Cheers.
 
Hmmmmmm returns said:
Absolutely anywhere, probably NE corner, would mean I’d have to move my season ticket but would be worth it.

Yeah, I do think it would help. A lot less dangerous throwing something sideways than down a massive tier drop.
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You talk common sense. Tunstall is not differentiating between life threatening behaviour and lower level violence.
All the things he says are less important than stopping glass bottles dropping as if from outer space onto fans
bat said:
Might they retaliate?
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Fine, in fact probably a good idea to remove this faux rivalry
 
chunkyshitehawk53 said:
How do other clubs manage this? There are surely a number where away fans are above the home fans? Mags still have away fans in the gods?
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A big issue is ticket availability mate. A large chunk of the tickets that are sold by a visiting team up here are done so via general sale (for example, 500 went to general sale for Coventry supporters)

Because anyone can buy a ticket, it means you often get wronguns in the away end.
 
My own email to the club requests the following actions. Feel free to copy and paste if you wish.
________________________________________________________________________________________

1. (That the club) Issue an immediate public statement condemning such behaviour from visiting fans and promising that a proper investigation is being undertaken immediately.

2. The club to contact the EFL, the Football Association and the visiting club and ask for their own views and intended actions. I understand that we, as a club, reduced the no. of tickets available to Coventry City yesterday because of previous actions of their fans. I believe that this type of action needs to be consistently taken by ALL clubs in the championship, i.e. Coventry City should have restriction placed on available away tickets at all Championship venues for an extensive period.

3. The promised investigation needs to have it's resulting actions communicated to Sunderland fans - particularly those of us who sit in the North Stand - including how CCTV and witness statements have been used to identify and take sanctions against the perpetrators.
 
tunstallhill said:
yeah, and neither am i employed to sort these things out, but i'm not stamping my feet demanding that the away end is moved downstairs without first thinking it through. no one else is thinking it through. no one can come up with suitable solution that involves moving them downstairs. it creates more problems than it solves, thats all i'm saying. i've already listed 4 or 5 things that the club could do right now, for this season, that would pretty much put an end to this missile throwing, without having to move the away end or inconvenience safc fans.

i'm still waiting for anyone to come up with a suitable suggestion for where we put a 3000-5000 seat block in the lower bowl for away fans?
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I and a lot of others on here were “stamping my feet“ as you childishly put it when it first announced that Shorts mob were moving them upstairs for the very reasons being discussed here.
When someone buys a club they buy its pros and cons. The siting of the away fans is a con. Is it gonna take a death for someone at SAFC to wake up and see this for what it is? I hope not for all our sakes.
 
bat said:
“it creates more problems than it solves, thats all i'm saying”
You keep saying this sort of stuff but you don’t give one iota of what these problems would be. I appreciate you are not in favour of moving away fans. But your vehement argument against is so strong but I would, genuinely, would change my mind if you provide alternatives that make more sense.
Cheers.
Click to expand...

its been pointed out on this thread already - a 60% rise in incidents outside the ground (if it was to go back to how it used to be). these incidents tend to be groups of away fans mouthing off, then groups of sunderland fans having a go back, and potentially some punches being thrown etc.. all in amongst a crowd of children, families and old people. those types of incidents is what i'm referring to. putting the away turnstiles bang in the middle of the busiest area of the outside of the stadium, where 80% of home fans walk past, is going to create aggro. aggro which doesn't exist now. so there, a problem created.

another problem, the seating arrangement inside. its not a problem now, we can sell 100% of the lower bowl to sunderland fans for any game we want, and hopefully for every game. put the away fans downstairs, and you have to block out 5000 seats for the away fans. you have to move potentially 5000 season ticket holders. every club that comes brings different amounts, so then you have empty blocks that we can't sell. there you go, another problem created that doesn't currently exist

then, at best, you put sunderland fans tight up against the away fans on both sides, and stuff gets thrown over, fans try to break through the stewards barrier, away fans end up on the pitch and potential clashes of fans in the stands and on the pitch (it happened when the fans were in the south stand) - something that can't possibly happen now - there you go, another problem created

then you have the cost and inconvenience of redesigning and reworking the concourse below, the seating, any fences that need putting up, segregation around the turnstiles etc.. we don't need any of that at the moment, so its not a problem. you move them downstairs, and there is another problem created

so, theres 4 problems off the top of my head that would be created by moving them downstairs, all of which don't exist currently.

we can solve the problem of the coventry fans throwing shit down without creating all of the above problems as a side effect
 
riffraff said:
I and a lot of others on here were “stamping my feet“ as you childishly put it when it first announced that Shorts mob were moving them upstairs for the very reasons being discussed here.
When someone buys a club they buy its pros and cons. The siting of the away fans is a con. Is it gonna take a death for someone at SAFC to wake up and see this for what it is? I hope not for all our sakes.
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I think it’s as stark as you articulate, club executives need to get their heads out of the sand
 
Hank Scorpio said:
A big issue is ticket availability mate. A large chunk of the tickets that are sold by a visiting team up here are done so via general sale (for example, 500 went to general sale for Coventry supporters)

Because anyone can buy a ticket, it means you often get wronguns in the away end.
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I get that. But it’s only been a coventry problem right? If so, the solution is obvious?
 
Chewit said:
You talk common sense. Tunstall is not differentiating between life threatening behaviour and lower level violence.
All the things he says are less important than stopping glass bottles dropping as if from outer space onto fans


Fine, in fact probably a good idea to remove this faux rivalry
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i totally agree that a bottle being thrown from 100 foot above is the most dangerous occurrence here. i think that that hazard can be dealt with, without moving the away fans. i think it makes more sense to deal with it as it is now, with the away fans up there, than deal with it by moving the away fans. not sure how else i can explain myself. i'm not suggesting just doing nothing, i've given about 5 or 6 suggestions already of things i think would be much more effective than simply moving the away fans
 
Chewit said:
Iam sure he is. But let’s get back to the issue. SAFC are not addressing the issue and putting fans at risk. What are they doing about it? if only to save their own necks should someone get seriously hurt
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Being honest mate, I don’t think the club (or certainly those higher up) are doing a thing about it. I dare say a load of us have sent emails/letters in the last 24 hours but I fully expect radio silence from them as they will hope it will go away

For whatever reason, they seem terrified to deal with the situation. As I posted last night, serious questions also have to be asked about why we even give Coventry the additional 500 tickets. Does the additional £15k revenue mean so much to us?

The one thing that is for certain is; unless the club do something, a fan will be seriously hurt in the north stand lower. What they fail to grasp is, it could easily be a “nice” club that causes the incident as it just takes one arseholes to chuck something
 
riffraff said:
I and a lot of others on here were “stamping my feet“ as you childishly put it when it first announced that Shorts mob were moving them upstairs for the very reasons being discussed here.
When someone buys a club they buy its pros and cons. The siting of the away fans is a con. Is it gonna take a death for someone at SAFC to wake up and see this for what it is? I hope not for all our sakes.
Click to expand...

maybe there were a lot of others who thought it was a bad idea, there were also many many people who thought it was a good idea, all things considered. just because some other people agree with you, doesn't mean that you are overwhelmingly right. just as i am not 100% right. its not a black and white situation, its complex, and there is many different combinations of things that can be done

i just don't think that moving the away fans in the answer.
 
tunstallhill said:
its been pointed out on this thread already - a 60% rise in incidents outside the ground (if it was to go back to how it used to be). these incidents tend to be groups of away fans mouthing off, then groups of sunderland fans having a go back, and potentially some punches being thrown etc.. all in amongst a crowd of children, families and old people. those types of incidents is what i'm referring to. putting the away turnstiles bang in the middle of the busiest area of the outside of the stadium, where 80% of home fans walk past, is going to create aggro. aggro which doesn't exist now. so there, a problem created.

another problem, the seating arrangement inside. its not a problem now, we can sell 100% of the lower bowl to sunderland fans for any game we want, and hopefully for every game. put the away fans downstairs, and you have to block out 5000 seats for the away fans. you have to move potentially 5000 season ticket holders. every club that comes brings different amounts, so then you have empty blocks that we can't sell. there you go, another problem created that doesn't currently exist

then, at best, you put sunderland fans tight up against the away fans on both sides, and stuff gets thrown over, fans try to break through the stewards barrier, away fans end up on the pitch and potential clashes of fans in the stands and on the pitch (it happened when the fans were in the south stand) - something that can't possibly happen now - there you go, another problem created

then you have the cost and inconvenience of redesigning and reworking the concourse below, the seating, any fences that need putting up, segregation around the turnstiles etc.. we don't need any of that at the moment, so its not a problem. you move them downstairs, and there is another problem created

so, theres 4 problems off the top of my head that would be created by moving them downstairs, all of which don't exist currently.

we can solve the problem of the coventry fans throwing shit down without creating all of the above problems as a side effect
Click to expand...
This doesn’t make sense. Every ground has to exit the away fans successfully - just needs good policing. NE corner could be policed effectively.
 
the sleeping giant said:
My own email to the club requests the following actions. Feel free to copy and paste if you wish.
________________________________________________________________________________________

1. (That the club) Issue an immediate public statement condemning such behaviour from visiting fans and promising that a proper investigation is being undertaken immediately.

2. The club to contact the EFL, the Football Association and the visiting club and ask for their own views and intended actions. I understand that we, as a club, reduced the no. of tickets available to Coventry City yesterday because of previous actions of their fans. I believe that this type of action needs to be consistently taken by ALL clubs in the championship, i.e. Coventry City should have restriction placed on available away tickets at all Championship venues for an extensive period.

3. The promised investigation needs to have it's resulting actions communicated to Sunderland fans - particularly those of us who sit in the North Stand - including how CCTV and witness statements have been used to identify and take sanctions against the perpetrators.
Click to expand...

Well done mate. I’ve sent similar this morning.

It will be interesting to see if/when we get a response. I suspect club officials have a debrief today, so you’d hope responses will start to go out tomorrow/Wed. If we hear nothing this week then they just ignoring us
 
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