Club statement: True blues?!

[shrimperjon]

What a disgrace. How can he come and blame southend fans. why did the club sell tickets to leicester fans. why were they allowed into a home end. southend fans fighting each other, is he having a laugh. i go home and away, we are great fans. never in trouble, dont go looking for it and dont get involved. King is a disgrace. so what if the club have to pay extra bills. it was an above average crowd, with high away support. this potentially was always likely to happen. i saw leicester fans in the east stand where i sit. they caused no trouble, but why were they allowed in. i can not believe the fans are being treated this way........I hope the trust get on board and respond to this.

 

[Ex-Member1]

For what it is worth, I had dealings with Mr KING over the Scunthorpe postponement fiasco and found his attitude stank then. I am not surprised at this current outburst. He seems to have little empathy with the fans.

 

[Crawliano]

What is it with people with the name Jeff/Geoff and the surname King that immediately turns them into complete tossers? We are so family friendly aren't we? Only last week I commented on how there was a berk in an Arsenal shirt in Block X. It's not the first time this has happened, basically if you're gonna come in another club's colours you're not getting in. Simple.

 

[Basildon Blue]

That is a ****ing disgrace. How the **** can he blame our supporters for something that was caused by leicester fans in our end. This is the clubs fault for selling tickets to leicester fans even when there were still a few seats left in the north stand. Also the stewards were not of a "sufficiently robust standard". They couldn't stop away fans running onto the pitch when they scored and didn't eject most of them despite the warnings that any fan who entered the field pf play would be ejected and banned from all grounds in th UK.

 

[Reg Martin]

It may well be that some Southend fans did behave badly on Saturday but I think there are several points the club (and police) have got to answer:

1) Why were the Leicester fans in the north bank allowed to stand throughout the match? The inconsistency of the application of this policy up and down the country seems to have an underlying bottom line that if away fans turn up in large numbers the stewards back off, especially if that clubs fans have a “reputation”. If the away fans are relatively few in number then the stewards act tough.
2) Anyone who goes to football matches regularly could have anticipated that some Leicester fans would attempt to get on the pitch if they scored a goal that looked like clinching promotion, yet the lack of stewards in front of the north bank indicated that the club did not anticipate this.
3) Having been caught out by Leicester fans coming on the pitch after the first goal, why weren’t the numbers of stewards and police in front of north bank strengthened sufficiently to prevent same happening again after second goal?
4) When some Southend fans in the West Stand made a move to front of stand as if to invade the pitch, the stewards and police acted quickly to block this off and began filming Southend fans. Why was the same decisiveness not shown in dealing with Leicester fans? Why were Southend fans filmed?

Although the above points don’t justify Southend fans fighting with Leicester fans who had been allowed to buy tickets for the West Stand (itself something the club need to look into), I think they may well have been contributing factors in inflaming the situation

 

[TrueBlue]

Vote of no confidence in Geoff King? if thats how people feel?

 

[dashman]

He is a businessman; what should we expect.......!?!?

In business you never admit you have been at fault etc...

Cloud the issue as much as possible GK, we were not only there but in it.

 

[cockles is back]

CLUB STATEMENT: TRUE BLUES?!

Posted on: Mon 20 Apr 2009
Southend United Chief Executive Geoffrey King has today issued the following statement regarding Saturday's match with Leicester City:
Prior to the game on Saturday an arrangement had been reached with the Police to have their resources outside the ground on the basis that the Club's own stewarding and security was of a sufficiently robust standard to deal with any difficulties caused by away supporters. The Club has proved that it is capable of stewarding its matches in difficult circumstances on a number of occasions having a record envied by most other Clubs.
On Saturday at the match against Leicester City fighting broke out in the north end of the West Stand (block w) when it was discovered that four Leicester City fans had found themselves in that area. As a result the Police Commander of the day was forced to take the action of calling in the resources that he had outside the ground to quell the situation where police officers and stewards found themselves at the centre of a fight where Southend fans were fighting not only the four Leicester fans but amongst themselves as well. This action has cost the Club £8,000 in additional police charges, money which in all honesty could be put to much better uses.

I never stop seeking to understand why such mindless aggression exists in a sport which more and more is becoming a true family sport. What I do know is that I, the Board and Management of the Club will not tolerate such incidents and where possible the strongest action will be taken against those persons involved.

CCTV images are currently being processed to identify the culprits who once identified will be served with permanent banning orders.

Geoffrey King
Chief Executive

LIKE BY ANOTHER DAMIONN SCANNELL????

you shouldnt be involved in the football or customer service industry Mr King two industries you clearly have no passion or common sence in, everything that comes out of you bitter mouth seems to dig your hole even bigger, tell me why is there so much resentment to the fans of the club you are in a managment role of, is it something to do with the passion of southend fans?

maybe you need to be answering a few questions from your own fans, as to why you seemed to question the safety of southend fans/families etc by letting away fans, infiltrate home sections of the ground/bars etc, and of these leicester fans, that clearly outnumbered more than 4, I pressume you will be sending them a letter of apologie next?

 

[Bluesmanager]

Looks like Ron's next blog is going to be interesting...

 

[Reg Martin]

Looks like Ron's next blog is going to be interesting...

especially if he answers the questions I've just e-mailed him!

 

[Southminster_Shrimper]

Looks like Ron's next blog is going to be interesting...

well he wanted a new topic as he seemed to be suggesting the questions were being repeated.

 

[Billy Bests boot laces]

There were 4 guys sitting behind me in the South Upper in the first half, at half time they went over to a steward and were duly escorted to the away end, why weren't they ejected for buying tickets in the home end and who was the bird brain that sold them the tickets. Not hard is it, you're not on our booking system as previously purchasing tickets so we need to see some ID sir. How hard is that !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Makes you wonder why the leicester fans in W block did'nt do the same thing in the first half, especially when they must have realised they were in the most vocal block in the whole stand?.

 

[dashman]

Looks like Ron's next blog is going to be interesting...

Very true and the fact people have long memories etc...

I am somewhat surprised at fans saying that some years ago this was the 'norm' behaviour at RH, it was wrong then and it is wrong now; has society taught these people to condone such actions because of the past???

 

[Up the Shrimpers]

Shocking statement from the club, worst piece of PR from them for ages.

Thats the first I heard of Southend fans fighting each other, it's not mentioned in tonights Echo report on the trouble (page 2).

The Echo mentions 1 Leicester fan arrested for assualt in a separate incident & also 4 arrested for pitch invasion. With regards to the pitch invasion I thought the stewards done quite well, especially as the police were not there to prevent a pitch invasion as I first thought, but all walked around the pitch and straight to the West Stand to stare/video the Southend fans!

What I can't work out though is that the 4 Leicester that were arrested for pitch invasion were led away by security. I suppose they must hand them over to the Police outside the ground? What power do the stewards/security have to manhandle people?

 

[Fiftyone]

Poor old Geoff King - like a mangy old dog that needs putting down, any volunteers?.;)

 

[Norfolkshrimp]

Makes you wonder why the leicester fans in W block did'nt do the same thing in the first half, especially when they must have realised they were in the most vocal block in the whole stand?.

Exactly which tells me they probably had more front than Thorpe Bay and "incidents" like this are sadly to be expected when people go out of their way to wind others up.

 

[Andyhsufc]

What about setting up an online petition??

 

[CyrilSneer]

Southend fans fighting with eachother??!??! I saw no such thing!

Southend fans fighting each other. Where the hell did that come from. I saw no such thing, and would be willing to testify to that fact. joke

 

[GBJ]

What about setting up an online petition??

Petitioning what though?

 

[GodblessArthurRowley]

GK is right SUFC are mindless hooligans fighting each other all the time, who could forget that mass brawl amongst the away fans at Doncaster, the carnage in the away end at Chelsea, the bloodbaths at both LDV finals and the playoff final.
He forgets to mention that the reason it cost £8000 extra in policing is because the club sold tickets for the home end to away fans.
A little economical with the truth methinks.