As a Melbourne Victory fan, I’m deeply ashamed at how disgraceful some of our fans are. The performance of the Socceroos helped Australian football so much, but this incident sent us back 30 years. Australian football is dead and buried.
The existence of the Melbourne Victory and teams like them buried the sport there actually. The foundation of the a-league with no system of promotion/relegation from a bunch of franchise clubs with zero history is what did it.
@@shams3831 exactly. Just because someone threw a bucket I’m not suddenly appalled to Australian football and their world cup run 😂 Lots of people are overreacting. Of course what happened is vile and shouldn’t have happened and I fully stand behind all fans and think the APL made a wrong move but this whole incident didn’t change my mind in any way about the country and the football itself
To give people an idea just how deep the rivalry between Sydney and Melbourne runs, upon federation the debate about who should be the capital was firmly between the two cities and neither would back down. They had to settle on the compromise of founding a brand new city about half way between Sydney and Melbourne to be the capital. Canberra only exists because of the Sydney-Melbourne rivalry.
Didn’t know soccer and the rivalries were that big of a deal here. This is coming from a 40+ year old Australian who remembers when soccer wasn’t even shown on tv
"You've actually bailed out the APL from being in the hotseat" - this is EXACTLY the sentiment that every real Australian football fan has been repeating over the past few days. After the Sydney announcement (but before this bs), everyone was on our side in calling the Sydney grand finals deal a disgusting, anti-fan cash grab, and the APL was under a LOT of pressure... Now though, the media has completely forgotten about that and is just talking about football hooliganism. Incredible how the actions of a couple dozen pieces of shit can undermine the standing of the entire sport in the public eye.
@@blazedlemon1374 wouldn't put it past them. Was thinking could it be staged, usually they do crap like this for new laws and rules (outside sport too)
I'm a Victory fan, and passionately against the APL and their decision. But sorry, there is NO WAY that was staged. On another day, a metal bucket filled with sand could have done a lot worse or potentially killed Glover
Great video Z. This is definitely the darkest day for the A-League. The hooligans featured in this video absolutely crushed any momentum the fans had created to push back on the Sydney deal, so rough to see. As a supporter of the Wellington Phoenix, this sucks, as now if our team makes the grand final we have to travel overseas guaranteed. After two seasons with the club playing based out of Australia (because of Covid travel restrictions), I was really looking forward to the slim chance of a home grand final, now that certainly won't be happening for at least 3 years. A horrible decision by the APL, but the action those fans took was so far off the mark.
@@samuelpinder1215 700 new zealand dollars so more like 400 usd/pounds wages are lower here too and housing isnt any cheaper also 700 are the cheapest flights booked months in advance
Thank you for covering this Zealand. I've been an Aussie football fan ever since I first played in a paddock in the Victorian countryside, and the video from the match was abhorrent to witness. The worst part of it is that the more dominant Australian media services tends to demonise the sport because of the actions of these 'fans'. During the WC, watching the Socceroos battle with a 'never say die' attitude, it felt like the tides were changing. Now it's all gone. In the span of a couple of weeks, I've gone from being proud to being ashamed to be a football fan.
Hey Z - Great Video. I am an Australian who was at the game and have a few thoughts. 1 - The APL selling the rights to Sydney for the finals for the next three years was massively disliked by all soccer fans (except maybe Sydney fans) in Australia because it was done without public notification and kept under the radar until it happened. Claiming they are trying to create a "Wembley" is marketing speak; Australia is genuinely massive and it takes a ~$200 dollar flight, tickets, and accomodation to go to Sydney from Melbourne to view what would be the finals, while in the UK it is more manageble. 2 - The original plan was to stage a "walk out" at the 20th minute as mentioned to protest the sale of the finals. However, from the first minute of the game you could tell that some of the fans in Melbourne Victory's section were itching for an excuse to get on the field. Prior to the incident with Glover, the fans were right up against the barricade from about the 5th minute. 3 - Something that the media have not paid any attention to is how poorly managed the whole day was. It was known for a week that the walk-out was going to happen, so you would think that the venue would bolster security and have the police on hand incase something like this happened. Prior to the riot, there were a total of seven security guards at the Victory end. It was crazy, the guards already had their hands full extinguishing flares and stopping the people at the front from climbing over. The fact that AAMI park nor the A-League had more security for this was shocking. Not to mention, the Police did eventually arrive on the scene, about 5 minutes AFTER everything had gone down. They marched out, stood on the field for about 2 minutes and then left again... what was the point and where were they earlier? 4 - As an A-League fan it is really saddening to see. This is the most excited the country has been about soccer since the 2006 World Cup and was our chance to capitlise on the great performance by the lads. instead we get a very small group of hooligans that storm the pitch and set up back another 10 years. In Melbourne (and Australia in general) there is already an anti-soccer media slant due to the popularity of AFL and Rugby in other states, so the media will look for any excuse to dump on the sport. This just added more fuel to the fire. 5 - A minor correction, its is called "AAMI Park" not the "Melbourne Rectangular Stadium" :D Thank you for highlighting this, it was very upsetting and I really hope we can recover quickly. I agree with what you are saying about the APL never reversing the decision and glad you can see that the actions of a few have ruined the sport for many.
If you want a Wembley experience why not just make a stadium in Canberra and do it there? Then you don’t need to worry about who hosts the finals or the bias hosting a final may have for the home team? I’m just saying some ideas- I love Australian football, I have relatives over there and I hope to see things get better after this bleak moment
I understand the their point about Wembley, but it’s completely different. It’s a lot easier to get to Wembley from anywhere in England than in is to get to Sydney from Perth or Wellington
Thank you for covering this Zealand. Football in Australia, much like in the United States, has been rapidly growing over the past few years, and I feel like all the good work The World Cup has done to showcase Australian football not only on the world stage, but just locally, has been undone in the blink of an eye. I hope that fans of football in Australia and around the world will remember Australian football for the highs of the 2022 World Cup, rather than these horrific lows.
I don't feel like the domestic league has been growing in the last decade tbh, interest in the game yes but that's more the prem, A league feels like it's been in a decline.
@@DabDabGoose The league is a farce. I've been to a few finals in the past. used to go to victory games a bit. Couldn't care less about the a league these days.
@@DabDabGoose when I say football in Australia, I mean interest in the game from Australians, rather than interest in the A-League. The A-League has been uninteresting for a long time when it comes to being a fan, but I feel like the interest of football overall going up combined with a stronger performance than expected in the World Cup could’ve helped boost football in the country before this all happened.
I haven't seen anything about this with regards to the grand final being in Sydney but in 2019, Perth Glory hosted the final and got close to a sell-out of 60000 making it the highest-attended grand final in A league history. The top 7 finals in attendance numbers have also all occurred outside of Sydney. So the problem with the decision is it can't be about increasing attendance to the finals because if the team hosts it, the locals will show up.
Good vid Zealand. As an Aussie living in Perth it would roughly cost me 2k to see a grand final now. 3 years ago I got to see my team Perth Glory play in a home grand final, I will never get the opportunity to experience that again.
It's so bizarre, like the NFL can get away with it because the Super Bowl is a marketing spectacle that already costs upwards of US$3-4K, the A-League should try to accessibilitize their product imo to tap into an audience that may find it easier to get into the A-League than AFL/NRL/Cricket
@@ratedpending the superbowl is a cash grab. Basing your league off a far right country's league system and expecting your FA to not be cash grabbing is stupid. Get out of doing this finals shit and host a normal format like the prem or the bundesliga do
I was at the game with some friends and it’s genuinely the saddest any of us have ever been at the football. It was such a sad evening. We supported the two different teams and both so dejected because it really felt like the league died before our very eyes.
I'm an Aussie and am disgusted with the apl decision to host the finals in Sydney, and haven't heard a better description of the situation in Australia following that game. Bravo zea
Thanks, Z. I am a passionate Melbourne Victory fan, and was at this game. Could not agree with everything you've said here more. This was an incredibly well-researched video. Still pissed with the APL decision, but as you rightly said Victory fans as a collective have destroyed the protests we were building. The entirety of the punishments are still pending, but I fear this is the beginning of the end of the club and league I love so much
The A League used to be own/run by the FA. The clubs insisted they could run it better, make more money, grow the game etc. They then formed the APL. The APL sold the TV rights to a start-up streaming service. Turns out there were subscription targets that were not met, hence the APL going looking for money to cover the shortfall. Many of the same fans criticising the APL are the same ones who bought hook, line and sinker that the APL replacing the FA would be some sort of golden bullet. The 'fans' (hooligans) actually quite enjoy chasing away moderate fans. Makes the game more exclusive to them and amplifies their perceived influence.
A very well-rounded analysis there. As you correctly pointed out, Australia is huge, and travelling around can be a chore. Melbourne to Sydney is a 9 hour drive on average, and that's one of the quicker journeys between state capitals.
Surprised to see our game covered. (And covered so well with detail and context). We've worked so hard for years to get where we are and the sense of pride following the WC was great and led to us feeling we could grow the game here. Across the league a 20 min walkout was agreed to by fan groups and had been very strong so far- the derby was set to be the pinnacle and instead has ensured we return to the overpolicing of fans (removal of active support drums, posters that are A3 etc), no flares, no change to the finals, and no incentive for APL to ever heed fan recommendations. Thanks for Covering Z
As a Western United fan (the third, forgotten Melbourne club), it was really upsetting when I had just wanted to enjoy a great rivalry game. Something like this had not happened since the early 80s when our football clubs were very "ethnically charged"
Throwing a flare that burns at 1000 degrees into a crowd hitting someone who didn’t thrown out isn’t inflammatory? If you brick your neighbours windows because someone else bricked yours you don’t think he’d react?
I can't imagine anyone getting sufficiently angry enough about the A-League to do something like this. It's a completely plastic league constructed out of American-style 'franchise' teams in order to build a brand, that subsequently destroyed grassroots football in the country by ensuring that real teams with actual history would have no chance whatsoever of making it into the top league ever again. Pitiful. The entire reason that the Australian national team went from being made up of players from the top leagues in Europe to... well, not, is because of this destruction of the grassroots system carried out by the businessman who conceived of the A-League.
You did a great job of covering all the ins and outs of this incredibly disappointing moment in Australian football Zealand. You just know this is massive if an American football fan is making a full video about it On the back of such a fabulous moment for our national team making the World Cup round of 16, the game should be on an upwards curve; and yet this disgusting behaviour has completely overshadowed that
The football writer of 40 years saying this is the worst he has seen has a short memory. The reason the A-League formed without the the old NSL teams was because of riots between ehnic based clubs, including one where bricks were hauled at the team buses.
Great Summary Z, been able to keep an eye on this with the NZ / Wellington Phoenix connection. Just incredibly stupid and it ruined the work from the other fan groups around the league who worked together and did sensible protests about the money hungry decision
Thanks for the vid Z! As a fan of City this is something that has been brewing for a while at Victory with there members throwing glass bottles at our womens goalkeeper one year and it being swept under the rug. Hopefully it dosent turn fans away from what is a great league! At least we still have our record of at least one red card each match week in the league haha
Honestly, apart from the bucket throw, this isn't the worst thing I have seen. And as for breaking goalposts, see Scotland at Wembley in the 70s when the goal frame broke and thr pitch itself was destroyed. As an aside I hate flares at football, and there is an upsurge in fan violence again, see the young City fan inured after being hit by an object thrown by Liverpool fans on Thursday night.
Are flares at games like this typical? I live in the US, and I've never seen a sporting event, live or otherwise, where fans had lit flares. Let alone then throwing lit flares around the stadium and on to the field. That seems absolutely insane.
Let's be honest in England we get at least 2 or 3 incidents like this a season. And it's getting worse largely due to the increase in Coke fuelled Stone Island clad knobheads going to games these days.
A friend who goes to a LOT of non-league games in England is noticing the huge increase in violent incidents since 2020. Getting worse everywhere it seems
@@kingleothesomethingsomethi285 lads from bigger clubs clicking up with smaller clubs because its easier too get in the ground for a punch up or in the smaller citiies where there are less old bill too police after the games ended...And as always drink and coke and not the coke you put with ice the snort you bang up for nose
@@kingleothesomethingsomethi285 In England hooliganism is a perennial issue hence why it's called the "English Disease" it usually riles up due to the poor economic situation as well as glorification and nostalgia of the 70s and 80s "golden age" of football violence
@@kingleothesomethingsomethi285 General decrease in satisfaction and lowering quality of life? Granted some people will always be hoolies, but when circumstances are bad enough people will lash out because they don't feel like they can do anything else. Not to excuse it, mind.
People like this have no business being allowed in any sports venue...EVER. We as sports fans, love sports because it allows us to be passionate about something away from our every day lives, but almost all of us do not take our passion too far. Sadly, not everyone is like this and these morons did not even get their point across while ruining the game for everyone else and putting the team and organization itself in a very bad situation.
In Australia, it was the nadir of Australian football. In Indonesia, it was so normal that even 135 deaths have not resulted in any meaningful change thus far.
As an Australian, this behaviour is terrible, and simply unacceptable. All throughout the past week or so of games, fans of teams - no matter where they are from, whether they be Melbourne, Wellington [New Zealand], and even Central Coast, they have been walking out on the 20th minute for protests. The fact that the APL hid what was happening from the people, until it happened, it really set off everything really. Because, travel is expensive, accomodations in Sydney are bogus, and the amount of $$$ that will be needed to simply see two Non-Sydney teams in a Sydney Venue is stupid. The people that charged the pitch, it has been announced that a dozen or so of them, were actually part of a radical Hooligan group [they don't deserve to be named], which had been banned and forced to desist, however, they are clearly still around, and have been for the past decade or so, or whenever the A-League formed. All in all, this is what happens when you try to get political in Sport.
This is a part of football, like it or not, every once in a while you will get passionate fans getting rowdy. It happens in amateur football all the time, players, fans, whatever, getting into a massive brawl, I've been in some here in Argentina.
Man! This video was highlited on my start page for like forever and after finishing it I'm so disappointed in myself that i haven't watched it earlier...
i grew up with argentine football , even the barras ( hooligans ) there needed a bit more to storm the pitch.... those guys were just looking for an excuse to cause trouble...
As an Australian, watching this happen doesnt particularly surprise me. During the WC vs Argentina, went to watch it with a couple thousand people in a city square. In that time i watched at least 3 people be arrested, 2 of which for tackling someone off a platform, a junkie try to start a fight with a tree, and my mate be hit in the chest with a flair.
Why is it that football always 'dies' when a handful of stupid idiots do something stupid and idiotic? Ban and take legal actions against the person(s) doing this, not the club. Deducting points, playing behind closed doors etc mostly affects the 97% of people just wanting to enjoy a game with their favorite team. And sure, when stuff like this happen you always have to review your security plan etc. I used to work at a bar (and some summers I ran a bar at festivals) where drunk guys did stupid s*** all the time. Throwing beer glasses at the band playing, getting into fights, stealing. You don't hear 'oh the bar scene is dead' or 'music is dead'. Punish the individual, not the club!
As a Brit- hooliganism is literally ruining the game. It’s so depressing, especially at this time of year and after a brilliant World Cup run for the Aussies, to see it impact Australia. Come on folks you can do better than this. Protest against the Australian FA through other means than just violence. But yes a very dark day for not just Australian football but for football on the global stage. Just don’t follow us Brits as inspiration for riots- too many have died and lives wasted for no reason because of hooliganism. It should have no place in our game no matter what nation it occurs in!
So let me get this straight, when the person who threw the flare out onto the field which was mostly empty that was dangerous act but when the goal keeper threw it into a crowd of people who had no space to move and avoid it then that was just acceptable? Like do you hear yourself when you talk?
That was a mob of angry idiots, and the keeper just threw the flare back at that mob of stupid angry idiots, don't ever do that. This 2022 there was a match between Santos and Corinthians for the Copa do Brasil, for the second leg after Corinthians hammered a 4x0 against Santos on the first leg, and there were many Santos fans throwing flares, fireworks and even small loud bombs at Cássio, Corinthians' goalkeeper. It looked like a warzone. Cássio simply took the flares out of the pitch, without throwing it back at the fans, and even with that, some fans invaded the pitch after the match ended to try and harm him, but imagine if he had thrown the flares back at them, things would get much more wild
Bit more context to the overall incident from an Australian and victory supporter. 1. The ‘fans’ in question here are from the active supporters group (our version of ultras) original style Melbourne or OSM. As stated OSM and the city active supporters group city terrace where supposed to leave at the 20 minute mark as it’s been reported that the overall sum of money that the NSW government has paid the APL for the grand final rights over the next three years is 20 million 2. There is already a deep seated anger towards NSW from many non NSW people due to the believe and sometimes quiet roundly true that NSW simply buys events for the good of it and never has true intentions for the actual event in the first place and only ever uses them as part of its marketing campaigns 3. The CEO of the APL Danny Townsend said that soccer has only had a limited history in Australia and hasn’t been able to establish it self yet, this completely undermined the entire history that was the NSL in Australia and played a role in stoking the heightened tension between the fan bases 4. The crowd number in large part even though neglected by Zealand, symbolises the divide between the two fan bases even more. Melbourne victory is a foundation club of the A-League with it also winning 4 premierships along with two other domestic titles. City on the over hands has its roots placed in the expansion club called Melbourne hearts, hearts was bought out by the city football group (Man City ownership group) and renamed to Melbourne city. For many people of Melbourne victory is seen as the people’s club given it’s history while city is seen as the outsiders and more traditionally targeted towards the higher class of the city of Melbourne. This plays into the crowd numbers, Victory has always been a league leader in regards to crown numbers while city has often been highly criticised for the lack of numbers at there games even after they won the league title a couple of years back they struggled to have 8-9k crowd attendances. This game in question was a City home game which played a role in the low crowd numbers even though it was a derby match. These main things along with others led to the overall tension being at nuclear levels with the actions that occurred by both the OSM members in throwing the flares and then Tom Glover throwing it back at them becoming the spark that led to the incident erupting
@@Priority76 less tickets available for Victory Fans (who are basically confined to the North End, when City played away against Victory they only got an away bay) which means reasonably there should be a better atmosphere supporting City (which isn't really the case). Yes it's the same ground but lots of homeground advantage comes from fans
They made this decision without telling anyone and totally ruined the fallout of Australia actually having a great world cup.EVERYONE is against this. Well the supporters are.
After Sydney FC beat Celtic then we did well in the world cup i finally thought people would start thinking higher of the A-league but now that's all been wasted.
I think you need to make this a series! Make videos discussing issues in football, and I'll give you the next one, choose West Bromwich Albion and the current running of the club🤣
So the APL thought that setting up a "Wembley" Type grand final in Sydney was a good idea.....its in no way comparable. The distance to travel is way to high for that. In England if your team got to Wembley for a cup final, then people have multiple travel options to get to the stadium on the day or the day before. In Australia your choice is basically fly and thats it unless you want to set off a week before the game in some cases. I saw someone bring up Wellington Phoenix reaching the grand final so I looked up something....Cost of flights on Qantas is £404 - $768NZD...just the flight, then game tickets and hotels you could easily clear $1000NZD just for the average fan to attend a game in Sydney...that is an insane amount of money. Yes some fans probably do that in the UK for a cup final but the vast majority will arrange coaches etc in order to allow max attendance for the smallest cost possible. Now if Perth Glory reached the final.....Qantas as the airline again here....£575 - $1027 AUD just for the FLIGHT!!!!. I even looked at a long distance UK team for flights so went with Carlisle to Heathrow and the cost was £99 for a round trip....So it would still be possible for a Carlisle United fan to fly to Heathrow, get the under ground in to Wembley....and probably dine at a Michelin Star restaurant all for the cost of the flight from Perth to Sydney.
AAMI park is pronounced like Amy home of the Mighty Melbourne Storm, IMO the reason the final is in Sydney is because of that new stadium that opened a few months ago.
If a bucket being thrown st someone's head is the darkest day in Australian football. What would Australian Football call Wisla Krakow fan hitting a Italian player in the head with a knife? Toughen up kangaroo girls
Respect Z for putting this video together and calling out the atrocious and inexcusable behaviour. Such a shame for this to detract from the achievements of our national team and the belief that it would spur on a new generation of kids wanting to play the sport.
Gotta say Zealand doesn’t quite understand the situation. Travel for finals in America is fine when the support and passion for the sport is so large. In the A-League we don’t have that. Home grand finals is what builds interest within the community and gains more fans. No new fans will pay even a thousand dollars to travel to Sydney for a final. Regardless of the distance being not as large as Americans travel. It’s very much an American take on an Australian problem. We aren’t America. Our general/sporting culture is different.
Additionally, I don’t believe throwing a flare back into the crowd can be seen as an uninflammatory action. That was just plain stupid. Throwing it into a crowd where not everyone could get out of the way.
I'd tend to disagree, in the larger Australian sports like NRL and AFL the grand finals have a sold out attendance at the grand final even if they are 2 teams from well outside the city. Broncos v cowboys in 2015 (both from brisbane and north queensland respectively) still was able to pull an attendance over 80k, selling out anz stadium. I'm sure there is an example of this with the perth, adelaide, brisbane and sydney teams as well in AFL
It has been a dark year in general regarding stadium violence. This one, the Querétaro Atlas riot, the Kanjuruhan disaster. The lack of in person football for 2 years due to Covid has done serious damage for the game. Pitch invasions are risky at the best of time, and can be absolutely devastating in the worse, yet people still called people who were against pitch invasions 'the fun police'. Many have seemingly lost their brains during the pandemic
The fun police are the ones who dont like it after promotion or winning the league when like 1 person was slightly injured. Probably ambulance chasers tbh. It's the same people that dislike smoke bombs even tho they're not doing anything other than being on the pitch and looking cool
The thing is 90% of Australians don't give a damn about local football and probably didn't know this happened unless they saw it on the news. Australians only know about Rugby, Rugby league or Australian rules football (depending on where they are from and what school they went to). Long before the A-League existed national football was teams who represented ethnic rivalries and it pretty much still is. There has been crowd violence before including one notorious instance many years ago during an international involving Israel. But not much on this scale. When craziness like this happens it's the time that local football gets the most coverage otherwise the media largely ignores it.
Shocking behaviour by the fans but the keeper shouldn’t have thrown the flares back, it could have hit a kid in the front row just because there are some idiot fans throwing flares doesn’t mean it’s all the fans, he should have let the stewards deal with it
But he would've been angry to be fair and he seemed to have underarms which means he wasn't putting much force into it so he wasn't trying to hurt anyone, he shouldn't be blamed but he didn't deal with it the right way definitely
What's weird about drawing parallels between Wembley.? So what if it's in another country. All teams have to travel to London whether they like it or not. Liverpool and Man City were forced to play there during a rail cancellation because of maintenance not long ago.
To add some context Melbourne has been for a long time until the last year the sporting capital of the world and the sporting capital of Australia. AFL, 2 football teams, Storm, Australian F1 (Which NSW have tried doing the same as the football), Australian Open, 2 X T20 cricket teams. Doesn't make what happened right though
"I don't think that was a particularly inflammatory action" If somebody threw a lit flare at me I'd be pretty angry about it. I probably wouldn't throw a bucket full of sand at them but I'd be pretty incensed.
Agreed. Of course throwing anything at a player is wrong, but if you are a player, you should not throw it back to the "supporters", because they will obviously react violently
I only watch A-league games in person. Like I usually don't watch it on TV, but living in Melbourne, I could sense it. I watched this game on stream, because shit was clearly going to go down.
Overall good video, but a couple corrections. The protest was united across all teams in the league and had occurred in all other matches already played that round. The victory fans had been also launching small fireworks into the air before the stoppage and whilst I am not blaming the police, they failed to act upon. Furthermore the game had been stopped as a result of city fans throwing flare onto the pitch at the victory keepers end. Finally the people who did this are not real fans, just hooligans and many have received bans from any footballing activity, including the bucket thrower, meaning they cant attend any matches or even play in a Sunday league match as there name can not be registered.
Another issue between Victory and Melbourne City is the fact that Melbourne City are owned by Manchester City's parent company. The were previously Melbourne Heart until the takeover.
One question through. Before it was whatever city the team that was winning hosted was where it was. Doesn’t that mean that you could have a game anywhere in Australia and even farther away from places than Sydney in terms of travel. Well I guess at the end of the day it would at least let one of the home teams be in their city
All the good vibes of our World Cup run are gone. Unfortunately this has been building for quite a long time.
Blame the A league and the goalkeeper
@@StoutProper Yeah sure blame everyonr except thise who actually did something really wrong
@@yorampaar2011 the a league did nothing wrong? The goalkeeper didn’t throw a flat burning at 1000 degrees into a crowd of people?
@@StoutProper people shot a flare at the goalie what else is he meant to do with it
@@StoutProper no way you are actualyl turning this on the goalie who just threw it back lmao. get a life
As a Melbourne Victory fan, I’m deeply ashamed at how disgraceful some of our fans are. The performance of the Socceroos helped Australian football so much, but this incident sent us back 30 years. Australian football is dead and buried.
and it's fans like you who i feel sorry for. honest decent normal people who are going to get shafted by cunt bags like those invaders
The existence of the Melbourne Victory and teams like them buried the sport there actually. The foundation of the a-league with no system of promotion/relegation from a bunch of franchise clubs with zero history is what did it.
Dead and buried? Bit of an overreaction lmao
@@shams3831 exactly. Just because someone threw a bucket I’m not suddenly appalled to Australian football and their world cup run 😂
Lots of people are overreacting. Of course what happened is vile and shouldn’t have happened and I fully stand behind all fans and think the APL made a wrong move but this whole incident didn’t change my mind in any way about the country and the football itself
as it should be.
To give people an idea just how deep the rivalry between Sydney and Melbourne runs, upon federation the debate about who should be the capital was firmly between the two cities and neither would back down. They had to settle on the compromise of founding a brand new city about half way between Sydney and Melbourne to be the capital. Canberra only exists because of the Sydney-Melbourne rivalry.
Godamn and I was always wondering why was it Canberra lol it felt weird honestly
Didn’t know soccer and the rivalries were that big of a deal here. This is coming from a 40+ year old Australian who remembers when soccer wasn’t even shown on tv
@@mike04574 damn Australian football was never that popular huh? I always thought they had that bit of English blood in them lol
@@sbevexlr848 we got the shitty cricket and rugby genes
@@mike04574 is it now?
"You've actually bailed out the APL from being in the hotseat" - this is EXACTLY the sentiment that every real Australian football fan has been repeating over the past few days. After the Sydney announcement (but before this bs), everyone was on our side in calling the Sydney grand finals deal a disgusting, anti-fan cash grab, and the APL was under a LOT of pressure... Now though, the media has completely forgotten about that and is just talking about football hooliganism.
Incredible how the actions of a couple dozen pieces of shit can undermine the standing of the entire sport in the public eye.
Almost too convenient maybe? Foul play from APL? The timing seems fishy. Though I should possibly lay off the weed.
@@blazedlemon1374 lay off the weed son, this is just shit fan behaviour. Not everything is a conspiracy
@@blazedlemon1374 wouldn't put it past them. Was thinking could it be staged, usually they do crap like this for new laws and rules (outside sport too)
I'm a Victory fan, and passionately against the APL and their decision. But sorry, there is NO WAY that was staged. On another day, a metal bucket filled with sand could have done a lot worse or potentially killed Glover
@@blazedlemon1374 yeah I was thinking the exact same thing brother.
Great video Z. This is definitely the darkest day for the A-League. The hooligans featured in this video absolutely crushed any momentum the fans had created to push back on the Sydney deal, so rough to see. As a supporter of the Wellington Phoenix, this sucks, as now if our team makes the grand final we have to travel overseas guaranteed. After two seasons with the club playing based out of Australia (because of Covid travel restrictions), I was really looking forward to the slim chance of a home grand final, now that certainly won't be happening for at least 3 years. A horrible decision by the APL, but the action those fans took was so far off the mark.
But dont you have to travel internationally every other game. Also it's a 2 hour flight that's nothing
@@samuelpinder1215Two three hour flights costing around seven hundred dollars with immigration, customs and biosecurity at either end.
@@adambyrne1201 bruh I didnt know New Zealand was that affected by the oil crisis
@@samuelpinder1215 700 new zealand dollars so more like 400 usd/pounds wages are lower here too and housing isnt any cheaper also 700 are the cheapest flights booked months in advance
@@youtubeuser6299 yeah it's like 345 pounds which is expensive for a 3 hour flight. I could fly newcastle (england) to alicante for just over £100
Thank you for covering this Zealand. I've been an Aussie football fan ever since I first played in a paddock in the Victorian countryside, and the video from the match was abhorrent to witness.
The worst part of it is that the more dominant Australian media services tends to demonise the sport because of the actions of these 'fans'. During the WC, watching the Socceroos battle with a 'never say die' attitude, it felt like the tides were changing. Now it's all gone. In the span of a couple of weeks, I've gone from being proud to being ashamed to be a football fan.
Victorians will be Victorians
Hey Z - Great Video. I am an Australian who was at the game and have a few thoughts.
1 - The APL selling the rights to Sydney for the finals for the next three years was massively disliked by all soccer fans (except maybe Sydney fans) in Australia because it was done without public notification and kept under the radar until it happened. Claiming they are trying to create a "Wembley" is marketing speak; Australia is genuinely massive and it takes a ~$200 dollar flight, tickets, and accomodation to go to Sydney from Melbourne to view what would be the finals, while in the UK it is more manageble.
2 - The original plan was to stage a "walk out" at the 20th minute as mentioned to protest the sale of the finals. However, from the first minute of the game you could tell that some of the fans in Melbourne Victory's section were itching for an excuse to get on the field. Prior to the incident with Glover, the fans were right up against the barricade from about the 5th minute.
3 - Something that the media have not paid any attention to is how poorly managed the whole day was. It was known for a week that the walk-out was going to happen, so you would think that the venue would bolster security and have the police on hand incase something like this happened. Prior to the riot, there were a total of seven security guards at the Victory end. It was crazy, the guards already had their hands full extinguishing flares and stopping the people at the front from climbing over. The fact that AAMI park nor the A-League had more security for this was shocking. Not to mention, the Police did eventually arrive on the scene, about 5 minutes AFTER everything had gone down. They marched out, stood on the field for about 2 minutes and then left again... what was the point and where were they earlier?
4 - As an A-League fan it is really saddening to see. This is the most excited the country has been about soccer since the 2006 World Cup and was our chance to capitlise on the great performance by the lads. instead we get a very small group of hooligans that storm the pitch and set up back another 10 years. In Melbourne (and Australia in general) there is already an anti-soccer media slant due to the popularity of AFL and Rugby in other states, so the media will look for any excuse to dump on the sport. This just added more fuel to the fire.
5 - A minor correction, its is called "AAMI Park" not the "Melbourne Rectangular Stadium" :D
Thank you for highlighting this, it was very upsetting and I really hope we can recover quickly. I agree with what you are saying about the APL never reversing the decision and glad you can see that the actions of a few have ruined the sport for many.
And AAMI is pronounced "Amy"
cheers for all the context mate
In the terms of number 3. I can answer that, they were OUTSIDE the ground in preparation for the walkout.
If you want a Wembley experience why not just make a stadium in Canberra and do it there? Then you don’t need to worry about who hosts the finals or the bias hosting a final may have for the home team?
I’m just saying some ideas- I love Australian football, I have relatives over there and I hope to see things get better after this bleak moment
I understand the their point about Wembley, but it’s completely different. It’s a lot easier to get to Wembley from anywhere in England than in is to get to Sydney from Perth or Wellington
Thank you for covering this Zealand. Football in Australia, much like in the United States, has been rapidly growing over the past few years, and I feel like all the good work The World Cup has done to showcase Australian football not only on the world stage, but just locally, has been undone in the blink of an eye. I hope that fans of football in Australia and around the world will remember Australian football for the highs of the 2022 World Cup, rather than these horrific lows.
I don't feel like the domestic league has been growing in the last decade tbh, interest in the game yes but that's more the prem, A league feels like it's been in a decline.
@@DabDabGoose The league is a farce. I've been to a few finals in the past. used to go to victory games a bit. Couldn't care less about the a league these days.
@@DabDabGoose when I say football in Australia, I mean interest in the game from Australians, rather than interest in the A-League. The A-League has been uninteresting for a long time when it comes to being a fan, but I feel like the interest of football overall going up combined with a stronger performance than expected in the World Cup could’ve helped boost football in the country before this all happened.
@@DabDabGoose it’s regressed
"rapidly growing" lmfao
As a jets fan in the a-leauge I’m outraged at the victory fans, but I’m most outraged at the owners of the a-leauge
up the jets
@@aidenwaters3687 Up the jets
I haven't seen anything about this with regards to the grand final being in Sydney but in 2019, Perth Glory hosted the final and got close to a sell-out of 60000 making it the highest-attended grand final in A league history. The top 7 finals in attendance numbers have also all occurred outside of Sydney. So the problem with the decision is it can't be about increasing attendance to the finals because if the team hosts it, the locals will show up.
Good vid Zealand. As an Aussie living in Perth it would roughly cost me 2k to see a grand final now. 3 years ago I got to see my team Perth Glory play in a home grand final, I will never get the opportunity to experience that again.
It's so bizarre, like the NFL can get away with it because the Super Bowl is a marketing spectacle that already costs upwards of US$3-4K, the A-League should try to accessibilitize their product imo to tap into an audience that may find it easier to get into the A-League than AFL/NRL/Cricket
Couldn't agree more. For me, seeing the roar at a packed Lang park on grand final day is something I will never forget.
@@ratedpending the superbowl is a cash grab. Basing your league off a far right country's league system and expecting your FA to not be cash grabbing is stupid. Get out of doing this finals shit and host a normal format like the prem or the bundesliga do
@@samuelpinder1215 are you equating playoffs to far right politics
@@ratedpending yeah they're money stints. Basically capitalism it its (un)finest
I was at the game with some friends and it’s genuinely the saddest any of us have ever been at the football. It was such a sad evening. We supported the two different teams and both so dejected because it really felt like the league died before our very eyes.
I'm an Aussie and am disgusted with the apl decision to host the finals in Sydney, and haven't heard a better description of the situation in Australia following that game. Bravo zea
Thanks, Z. I am a passionate Melbourne Victory fan, and was at this game. Could not agree with everything you've said here more. This was an incredibly well-researched video.
Still pissed with the APL decision, but as you rightly said Victory fans as a collective have destroyed the protests we were building. The entirety of the punishments are still pending, but I fear this is the beginning of the end of the club and league I love so much
The A League used to be own/run by the FA.
The clubs insisted they could run it better, make more money, grow the game etc. They then formed the APL.
The APL sold the TV rights to a start-up streaming service. Turns out there were subscription targets that were not met, hence the APL going looking for money to cover the shortfall.
Many of the same fans criticising the APL are the same ones who bought hook, line and sinker that the APL replacing the FA would be some sort of golden bullet.
The 'fans' (hooligans) actually quite enjoy chasing away moderate fans. Makes the game more exclusive to them and amplifies their perceived influence.
A very well-rounded analysis there. As you correctly pointed out, Australia is huge, and travelling around can be a chore. Melbourne to Sydney is a 9 hour drive on average, and that's one of the quicker journeys between state capitals.
Liked the video Z. More of this please, Z reporting on interesting football-events and news all over the world!
Surprised to see our game covered. (And covered so well with detail and context). We've worked so hard for years to get where we are and the sense of pride following the WC was great and led to us feeling we could grow the game here. Across the league a 20 min walkout was agreed to by fan groups and had been very strong so far- the derby was set to be the pinnacle and instead has ensured we return to the overpolicing of fans (removal of active support drums, posters that are A3 etc), no flares, no change to the finals, and no incentive for APL to ever heed fan recommendations.
Thanks for Covering Z
As a Western United fan (the third, forgotten Melbourne club), it was really upsetting when I had just wanted to enjoy a great rivalry game. Something like this had not happened since the early 80s when our football clubs were very "ethnically charged"
The completely league made team no one asked for and still doesn’t have its promised home stadium that got it into the league..
Throwing a flare that burns at 1000 degrees into a crowd hitting someone who didn’t thrown out isn’t inflammatory? If you brick your neighbours windows because someone else bricked yours you don’t think he’d react?
as someone who watches the greek superleage regularly I can only say, welcome to the club, honorary Balkans
I can't imagine anyone getting sufficiently angry enough about the A-League to do something like this. It's a completely plastic league constructed out of American-style 'franchise' teams in order to build a brand, that subsequently destroyed grassroots football in the country by ensuring that real teams with actual history would have no chance whatsoever of making it into the top league ever again. Pitiful.
The entire reason that the Australian national team went from being made up of players from the top leagues in Europe to... well, not, is because of this destruction of the grassroots system carried out by the businessman who conceived of the A-League.
Just a correction, the distance by road from Melbourne to Sydney isn't anything short, it's actually almost 550 miles.
I think it was actually a sellout in that game but it some fans had already left cus of 20 min walkout and 21st minute was when incident happened
You did a great job of covering all the ins and outs of this incredibly disappointing moment in Australian football Zealand. You just know this is massive if an American football fan is making a full video about it
On the back of such a fabulous moment for our national team making the World Cup round of 16, the game should be on an upwards curve; and yet this disgusting behaviour has completely overshadowed that
Thanks for covering this
The football writer of 40 years saying this is the worst he has seen has a short memory. The reason the A-League formed without the the old NSL teams was because of riots between ehnic based clubs, including one where bricks were hauled at the team buses.
Great Summary Z, been able to keep an eye on this with the NZ / Wellington Phoenix connection. Just incredibly stupid and it ruined the work from the other fan groups around the league who worked together and did sensible protests about the money hungry decision
Thanks for the vid Z! As a fan of City this is something that has been brewing for a while at Victory with there members throwing glass bottles at our womens goalkeeper one year and it being swept under the rug. Hopefully it dosent turn fans away from what is a great league! At least we still have our record of at least one red card each match week in the league haha
Honestly, apart from the bucket throw, this isn't the worst thing I have seen. And as for breaking goalposts, see Scotland at Wembley in the 70s when the goal frame broke and thr pitch itself was destroyed.
As an aside I hate flares at football, and there is an upsurge in fan violence again, see the young City fan inured after being hit by an object thrown by Liverpool fans on Thursday night.
Are flares at games like this typical? I live in the US, and I've never seen a sporting event, live or otherwise, where fans had lit flares. Let alone then throwing lit flares around the stadium and on to the field. That seems absolutely insane.
@@jeffcanar7294 they are on the continent and becoming more so here in Britain too
Let's be honest in England we get at least 2 or 3 incidents like this a season. And it's getting worse largely due to the increase in Coke fuelled Stone Island clad knobheads going to games these days.
@@michaelscott7166 toilets at Ibrox you can't move for the small of dope and folk rattling ching
@@TheGordybear what has a flare done to you. You're alive, it's clearly alright. Everyone in europe does it why are we being such crybabies about it
The stadium might not have been completely full but that is actually quite full considering the usual crowd numbers in the a league
Was sold out
A friend who goes to a LOT of non-league games in England is noticing the huge increase in violent incidents since 2020. Getting worse everywhere it seems
What do you think could be causing this ?
It's aways been bad in England it's never truly gone away here. Football hooliganism is normal here but haven't had a big incident for a while
@@kingleothesomethingsomethi285 lads from bigger clubs clicking up with smaller clubs because its easier too get in the ground for a punch up or in the smaller citiies where there are less old bill too police after the games ended...And as always drink and coke and not the coke you put with ice the snort you bang up for nose
@@kingleothesomethingsomethi285 In England hooliganism is a perennial issue hence why it's called the "English Disease" it usually riles up due to the poor economic situation as well as glorification and nostalgia of the 70s and 80s "golden age" of football violence
@@kingleothesomethingsomethi285 General decrease in satisfaction and lowering quality of life? Granted some people will always be hoolies, but when circumstances are bad enough people will lash out because they don't feel like they can do anything else.
Not to excuse it, mind.
People like this have no business being allowed in any sports venue...EVER. We as sports fans, love sports because it allows us to be passionate about something away from our every day lives, but almost all of us do not take our passion too far. Sadly, not everyone is like this and these morons did not even get their point across while ruining the game for everyone else and putting the team and organization itself in a very bad situation.
In Australia, it was the nadir of Australian football.
In Indonesia, it was so normal that even 135 deaths have not resulted in any meaningful change thus far.
As an Australian, this behaviour is terrible, and simply unacceptable. All throughout the past week or so of games, fans of teams - no matter where they are from, whether they be Melbourne, Wellington [New Zealand], and even Central Coast, they have been walking out on the 20th minute for protests.
The fact that the APL hid what was happening from the people, until it happened, it really set off everything really. Because, travel is expensive, accomodations in Sydney are bogus, and the amount of $$$ that will be needed to simply see two Non-Sydney teams in a Sydney Venue is stupid.
The people that charged the pitch, it has been announced that a dozen or so of them, were actually part of a radical Hooligan group [they don't deserve to be named], which had been banned and forced to desist, however, they are clearly still around, and have been for the past decade or so, or whenever the A-League formed.
All in all, this is what happens when you try to get political in Sport.
first video I have ever watched from your channel and not sure how you never showed up on my feed. HARD SUBSCRIBE
That's a stain that won't wash off easily, especially after all the work that has been done to erase a very similar set of stains.
Thanks for this Zealand. Hadn't seen any of this until now.
Never expected Aussies to turn back to there factory settings after the goalie threw that flare back 😂😂
This is a part of football, like it or not, every once in a while you will get passionate fans getting rowdy. It happens in amateur football all the time, players, fans, whatever, getting into a massive brawl, I've been in some here in Argentina.
Man! This video was highlited on my start page for like forever and after finishing it I'm so disappointed in myself that i haven't watched it earlier...
You’re the Best American football RUclips channel congrats ! And one of the few Americans that knows what they’re talking about
Thanks for covering this. Such a body-blow to the sport in Oz after a massive World Cup boost. Have a safe Xmas, Z.
i grew up with argentine football , even the barras ( hooligans ) there needed a bit more to storm the pitch.... those guys were just looking for an excuse to cause trouble...
Yeah, not even barras storm the litch anymore lmao, those assholes just wanted to do something for fun
As an Australian, watching this happen doesnt particularly surprise me. During the WC vs Argentina, went to watch it with a couple thousand people in a city square. In that time i watched at least 3 people be arrested, 2 of which for tackling someone off a platform, a junkie try to start a fight with a tree, and my mate be hit in the chest with a flair.
Why is it that football always 'dies' when a handful of stupid idiots do something stupid and idiotic?
Ban and take legal actions against the person(s) doing this, not the club. Deducting points, playing behind closed doors etc mostly affects the 97% of people just wanting to enjoy a game with their favorite team. And sure, when stuff like this happen you always have to review your security plan etc.
I used to work at a bar (and some summers I ran a bar at festivals) where drunk guys did stupid s*** all the time. Throwing beer glasses at the band playing, getting into fights, stealing. You don't hear 'oh the bar scene is dead' or 'music is dead'.
Punish the individual, not the club!
Aussie here and big a league fan you did this video justice Zealand, hope you can do more of these in the future
As a Brit- hooliganism is literally ruining the game. It’s so depressing, especially at this time of year and after a brilliant World Cup run for the Aussies, to see it impact Australia. Come on folks you can do better than this. Protest against the Australian FA through other means than just violence. But yes a very dark day for not just Australian football but for football on the global stage. Just don’t follow us Brits as inspiration for riots- too many have died and lives wasted for no reason because of hooliganism.
It should have no place in our game no matter what nation it occurs in!
not your normal Zealand video but i think you took the chance to use your platform to get a strong and needed message out. Thanks
Round of applause 👏 absolutely spot on.
THIS IS THE BEST VIDEO YOU EVER MADE, but I wish you never had to do it
If you throw a flare into a crowd then you are inciting a riot. From a Bradford City fan.
So let me get this straight, when the person who threw the flare out onto the field which was mostly empty that was dangerous act but when the goal keeper threw it into a crowd of people who had no space to move and avoid it then that was just acceptable? Like do you hear yourself when you talk?
That was a mob of angry idiots, and the keeper just threw the flare back at that mob of stupid angry idiots, don't ever do that. This 2022 there was a match between Santos and Corinthians for the Copa do Brasil, for the second leg after Corinthians hammered a 4x0 against Santos on the first leg, and there were many Santos fans throwing flares, fireworks and even small loud bombs at Cássio, Corinthians' goalkeeper. It looked like a warzone. Cássio simply took the flares out of the pitch, without throwing it back at the fans, and even with that, some fans invaded the pitch after the match ended to try and harm him, but imagine if he had thrown the flares back at them, things would get much more wild
Qatar showed a whole other level of stadiums security other countries should take notes.
Bit more context to the overall incident from an Australian and victory supporter.
1. The ‘fans’ in question here are from the active supporters group (our version of ultras) original style Melbourne or OSM. As stated OSM and the city active supporters group city terrace where supposed to leave at the 20 minute mark as it’s been reported that the overall sum of money that the NSW government has paid the APL for the grand final rights over the next three years is 20 million
2. There is already a deep seated anger towards NSW from many non NSW people due to the believe and sometimes quiet roundly true that NSW simply buys events for the good of it and never has true intentions for the actual event in the first place and only ever uses them as part of its marketing campaigns
3. The CEO of the APL Danny Townsend said that soccer has only had a limited history in Australia and hasn’t been able to establish it self yet, this completely undermined the entire history that was the NSL in Australia and played a role in stoking the heightened tension between the fan bases
4. The crowd number in large part even though neglected by Zealand, symbolises the divide between the two fan bases even more. Melbourne victory is a foundation club of the A-League with it also winning 4 premierships along with two other domestic titles. City on the over hands has its roots placed in the expansion club called Melbourne hearts, hearts was bought out by the city football group (Man City ownership group) and renamed to Melbourne city. For many people of Melbourne victory is seen as the people’s club given it’s history while city is seen as the outsiders and more traditionally targeted towards the higher class of the city of Melbourne. This plays into the crowd numbers, Victory has always been a league leader in regards to crown numbers while city has often been highly criticised for the lack of numbers at there games even after they won the league title a couple of years back they struggled to have 8-9k crowd attendances. This game in question was a City home game which played a role in the low crowd numbers even though it was a derby match.
These main things along with others led to the overall tension being at nuclear levels with the actions that occurred by both the OSM members in throwing the flares and then Tom Glover throwing it back at them becoming the spark that led to the incident erupting
But they both play at the same stadium. Why would it being a City "home" game make a difference? Just curious.
@@Priority76 less tickets available for Victory Fans (who are basically confined to the North End, when City played away against Victory they only got an away bay) which means reasonably there should be a better atmosphere supporting City (which isn't really the case). Yes it's the same ground but lots of homeground advantage comes from fans
Z! You dont seem normal in this video. Hope everything is fine with you ❤️ best wishes to you and the team. Merry Christmas
To be fair, it's a pretty serious subject, so it would be a bit odd for him to be overly cheery and crack jokes every 45 seconds
@@jamesr5827 well, you’re right
They made this decision without telling anyone and totally ruined the fallout of Australia actually having a great world cup.EVERYONE is against this. Well the supporters are.
After Sydney FC beat Celtic then we did well in the world cup i finally thought people would start thinking higher of the A-league but now that's all been wasted.
Great video Z. Massive respect.
I think you need to make this a series! Make videos discussing issues in football, and I'll give you the next one, choose West Bromwich Albion and the current running of the club🤣
Seeing Ray Gatt on a Zealand video is something i never thought i would see
So the APL thought that setting up a "Wembley" Type grand final in Sydney was a good idea.....its in no way comparable. The distance to travel is way to high for that. In England if your team got to Wembley for a cup final, then people have multiple travel options to get to the stadium on the day or the day before. In Australia your choice is basically fly and thats it unless you want to set off a week before the game in some cases. I saw someone bring up Wellington Phoenix reaching the grand final so I looked up something....Cost of flights on Qantas is £404 - $768NZD...just the flight, then game tickets and hotels you could easily clear $1000NZD just for the average fan to attend a game in Sydney...that is an insane amount of money. Yes some fans probably do that in the UK for a cup final but the vast majority will arrange coaches etc in order to allow max attendance for the smallest cost possible. Now if Perth Glory reached the final.....Qantas as the airline again here....£575 - $1027 AUD just for the FLIGHT!!!!. I even looked at a long distance UK team for flights so went with Carlisle to Heathrow and the cost was £99 for a round trip....So it would still be possible for a Carlisle United fan to fly to Heathrow, get the under ground in to Wembley....and probably dine at a Michelin Star restaurant all for the cost of the flight from Perth to Sydney.
I was thinking that this was about Australian Football (the game who's similar to rugby) not about the football in Australia. Quite a twist for me
Genuinely so disappointed to see this after such amazing scenes from down under during the World Cup.
AAMI park is pronounced like Amy home of the Mighty Melbourne Storm, IMO the reason the final is in Sydney is because of that new stadium that opened a few months ago.
Subbed. Great hosting
first time seeing you, great great video
Same thing happens in Chile by certain teams and it’s honestly tiring because they just get 2 matches without public and then they can go again
Great content Z.
"That's cute." - Every man, woman, and child in Queretaro.
Thx Zealand for these kind of videos and even more for calling these idiots what they are.
If a bucket being thrown st someone's head is the darkest day in Australian football. What would Australian Football call Wisla Krakow fan hitting a Italian player in the head with a knife?
Toughen up kangaroo girls
Just looked it up by the way, Google says it's a 545-mile drive....Yes, I was surprised too. They look so close on the map
I think Australia is forgetting that even tho we have Wembley England is tiny
Respect Z for putting this video together and calling out the atrocious and inexcusable behaviour. Such a shame for this to detract from the achievements of our national team and the belief that it would spur on a new generation of kids wanting to play the sport.
In Argentina away fans can't go to stadiums becose of violence.
Is it just me or is it really funny that a goalkeeper's last name is "glover" 😂
Gotta say Zealand doesn’t quite understand the situation.
Travel for finals in America is fine when the support and passion for the sport is so large. In the A-League we don’t have that. Home grand finals is what builds interest within the community and gains more fans. No new fans will pay even a thousand dollars to travel to Sydney for a final. Regardless of the distance being not as large as Americans travel.
It’s very much an American take on an Australian problem.
We aren’t America. Our general/sporting culture is different.
Additionally, I don’t believe throwing a flare back into the crowd can be seen as an uninflammatory action. That was just plain stupid. Throwing it into a crowd where not everyone could get out of the way.
I'd tend to disagree, in the larger Australian sports like NRL and AFL the grand finals have a sold out attendance at the grand final even if they are 2 teams from well outside the city. Broncos v cowboys in 2015 (both from brisbane and north queensland respectively) still was able to pull an attendance over 80k, selling out anz stadium. I'm sure there is an example of this with the perth, adelaide, brisbane and sydney teams as well in AFL
It has been a dark year in general regarding stadium violence. This one, the Querétaro Atlas riot, the Kanjuruhan disaster. The lack of in person football for 2 years due to Covid has done serious damage for the game. Pitch invasions are risky at the best of time, and can be absolutely devastating in the worse, yet people still called people who were against pitch invasions 'the fun police'. Many have seemingly lost their brains during the pandemic
The fun police are the ones who dont like it after promotion or winning the league when like 1 person was slightly injured. Probably ambulance chasers tbh. It's the same people that dislike smoke bombs even tho they're not doing anything other than being on the pitch and looking cool
It took me until half the video to start questioning the hat because of how immersed I was in the narration
I'm new to the channel, has Zealand done a video like this for the incident at the Querétaro vs Atlas game in Liga MX early this year?
The thing is 90% of Australians don't give a damn about local football and probably didn't know this happened unless they saw it on the news. Australians only know about Rugby, Rugby league or Australian rules football (depending on where they are from and what school they went to). Long before the A-League existed national football was teams who represented ethnic rivalries and it pretty much still is. There has been crowd violence before including one notorious instance many years ago during an international involving Israel. But not much on this scale. When craziness like this happens it's the time that local football gets the most coverage otherwise the media largely ignores it.
Shocking behaviour by the fans but the keeper shouldn’t have thrown the flares back, it could have hit a kid in the front row just because there are some idiot fans throwing flares doesn’t mean it’s all the fans, he should have let the stewards deal with it
But he would've been angry to be fair and he seemed to have underarms which means he wasn't putting much force into it so he wasn't trying to hurt anyone, he shouldn't be blamed but he didn't deal with it the right way definitely
Obviously the crowd's fault but also gk's fault for throwing it back
What's weird about drawing parallels between Wembley.? So what if it's in another country. All teams have to travel to London whether they like it or not. Liverpool and Man City were forced to play there during a rail cancellation because of maintenance not long ago.
To add some context Melbourne has been for a long time until the last year the sporting capital of the world and the sporting capital of Australia.
AFL, 2 football teams, Storm, Australian F1 (Which NSW have tried doing the same as the football), Australian Open, 2 X T20 cricket teams.
Doesn't make what happened right though
"I don't think that was a particularly inflammatory action"
If somebody threw a lit flare at me I'd be pretty angry about it. I probably wouldn't throw a bucket full of sand at them but I'd be pretty incensed.
Agreed. Of course throwing anything at a player is wrong, but if you are a player, you should not throw it back to the "supporters", because they will obviously react violently
least violent australian anarchist
I only watch A-league games in person. Like I usually don't watch it on TV, but living in Melbourne, I could sense it. I watched this game on stream, because shit was clearly going to go down.
I do find it funny that one of them just decided I'm stealing this ball it's mine now
Overall good video, but a couple corrections. The protest was united across all teams in the league and had occurred in all other matches already played that round. The victory fans had been also launching small fireworks into the air before the stoppage and whilst I am not blaming the police, they failed to act upon. Furthermore the game had been stopped as a result of city fans throwing flare onto the pitch at the victory keepers end. Finally the people who did this are not real fans, just hooligans and many have received bans from any footballing activity, including the bucket thrower, meaning they cant attend any matches or even play in a Sunday league match as there name can not be registered.
Another issue between Victory and Melbourne City is the fact that Melbourne City are owned by Manchester City's parent company. The were previously Melbourne Heart until the takeover.
Fine mesh nets used behind both goals in the bundesliga seem like a brilliant idea now. Don't they?
One question through. Before it was whatever city the team that was winning hosted was where it was. Doesn’t that mean that you could have a game anywhere in Australia and even farther away from places than Sydney in terms of travel. Well I guess at the end of the day it would at least let one of the home teams be in their city
Honestly I think the reason that all of this happened was because they were from Melbourne
Had to like comment and subscribe - great videos friend!
The best American to talk about Australia
After seeing this happen on TV in Australia it was horrible. These people are rabid and is unacceptable for Melbourne Victory.
As someone who was in the stands. Shit was fucked. I said to my boys up in the top tier, lets get out of here before the place blows up