"You call this a soccer riot!?"
I just finished "Hoolifan: 30 Years of Hurt" by Martin King and Martin Knight, two guys who know more about throwing punches than all of the boxers on "The Contender" combined. What this book did, though, was serve as a major eye-opener to a completely unfamiliar culture.
The book is set mostly in the late 60's and all of the 70's, when soccer "rioting" was in its hey-day. Now a thing of the past because of the heightened security concerns at stadiums these days. Martin King was a prominent member of the Chelsea Headhunters, a group of soccer "hooligans" who attended games primarily for the sport of kicking the tar out of the other team's supporters. And they were good at it too.
The amazing thing, though, was that even these groups of guys (and every team had one, as he vividly recounts his run-in with each team's groups throughout the book) had a strong sense of dignity. King himself actually likens the fights to boxers, in that both sides understand that they are going to get bashed, but are willing to shake the hand of the man striking him. Fighters whose reputation preceeded them at the stadiums would often receive standing ovations when they entered on a matchday from the opposing team's supporters. That's right. The very people that were the victims of his punches.
On a more general scale, it is amazing to be reading about a group of people who made a hobby of travelling from town to town (wherever the team went) and scrapping with the other team's supporters. That this became an actual sub-culture and has never really been experienced stateside is intriguing as well.
Even though almost the entire book is the authors recounting brawl after brawl, the book is an incredibly fascinating read from start to finish, if nothing else because of its shock value. The prevalence of this phenomenon is truly amazing.
The book is set mostly in the late 60's and all of the 70's, when soccer "rioting" was in its hey-day. Now a thing of the past because of the heightened security concerns at stadiums these days. Martin King was a prominent member of the Chelsea Headhunters, a group of soccer "hooligans" who attended games primarily for the sport of kicking the tar out of the other team's supporters. And they were good at it too.
The amazing thing, though, was that even these groups of guys (and every team had one, as he vividly recounts his run-in with each team's groups throughout the book) had a strong sense of dignity. King himself actually likens the fights to boxers, in that both sides understand that they are going to get bashed, but are willing to shake the hand of the man striking him. Fighters whose reputation preceeded them at the stadiums would often receive standing ovations when they entered on a matchday from the opposing team's supporters. That's right. The very people that were the victims of his punches.
On a more general scale, it is amazing to be reading about a group of people who made a hobby of travelling from town to town (wherever the team went) and scrapping with the other team's supporters. That this became an actual sub-culture and has never really been experienced stateside is intriguing as well.
Even though almost the entire book is the authors recounting brawl after brawl, the book is an incredibly fascinating read from start to finish, if nothing else because of its shock value. The prevalence of this phenomenon is truly amazing.
posted by Brad at
5:18 PM
1 Comments:
One of my favorite SNL skits was "Scottish Soccer Hooligans Weekly". I don't think we'll ever see that kind of fandom here in the US because we just don't have that kind of passion for soccer. The closest thing we'll see are fans that follow their favorite college team, like our beloved fans that love their Blue.
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