Artem Chobanian
Football in the countries of the former USSR becomes better with every year. But good teams and famous players are not enough to build a strong football community in Russia and Ukraine, as the most prominent countries of USSR in terms of football. Some two years ago, Italy was under siege by radical fans that almost destroyed Italian football and made people from all over the world look at the problem of anarchy amongst supporters with concern and a serious attitude. That wave reached Ukraine recently, and Ukrainian football has become a battlefield for the people that call themselves ‘fans’, but are, in fact, extremists or even terrorists!
Everything started almost a year ago, during the final match between Dynamo Kyiv and Shakhtar Donetsk, the two best teams in the Ukrainian Vyscha Liga. A small fight between fans was suppressed by the special militia forces, but in some minutes a huge battle began and the militia couldn’t take control of the situation… Some people died, many were injured, even among the militia. The FFU (Football Federation Ukraine) and PFL (Professional Football League), Ukraine’s two major football organisations, said they would find the solution to the problem and such accidents would never happen again.
But their promises were not realised. Moreover, this season has turned out to be even worse in terms of disorder at the stadiums. Almost two months ago, stadiums all over Ukraine became the places where fans came to hurt people and stop the games. As everywhere in the world, Ukrainian clubs have their ultras, vigorous supporters who cannot live without football. However, it turned out they cannot live without fighting either. Recent events in Ukraine showed that there was an epidemic, which has to be cured or it will kill Ukrainian football.
During the Metalist Kharkiv Vs Dnipro match, half-naked and drunk youths organised a big fight, injuring many people and almost destroying the stadium!
Later, at the end of the Naftovik Vs Dynamo Kyiv match, the fans started fires all over the ground, destroyed the seats, broke everything they touched… And one day before the match, Dynamo Kyiv supporters arrived in Ohtyrka, a local town for Naftovik, and behaved like vandals. Started numerous fights, broke shop windows, and even entered the monastery on the territory of Ohtyrka and destroyed things there. The town was in horror but the militia didn’t do anything.
But this is not the worst part. We can recall similar cases in the history of football, just remember Liverpool fans some 30 years ago, when a minority of supporters shocked Europe with their hooliganism. The ultras try to behave as wildly as possible, justifying their name, as this word mean ‘beyond’. They are beyond everything and everybody. In January, on a Dynamo Kyiv site, there was a message that in April during the Naftovik Vs Dynamo match the ultras would take revenge for Dynamo’s defeat in the first round of the season. And they did it! Just a day after the incident in Ohtyrka, that message disappeared from the site, but some football journalists copied it and now those words are printed in all Ukrainian sport periodicals.
There’s one more thing that bothers all ordinary people living in Ukraine. Many supporters bring fascist symbols to the game, shout out rude words and raise their hands the way the fascists did. For a country that lost about 10 million people in WWII these are blasphemous actions and common people do not want to accept them. The FFU and PFL get millions of complaints from all over Ukraine, but do nothing! Sport journalists are attacked in the streets if they write articles on this, and the Ukrainian militia cannot help.
The major concern of the clubs and people around Ukraine is that the Football Federation of Ukraine and the Professional Football League do not raise a finger to stop this situation. Journalists and the clubs’ representatives attack these organisations to urge them to act, but in vain! That’s most surprising in the light of Euro 2012 and the visit of Michel Platini last month, when the head of UEFA was amazed with the nonchalance of the Ukrainian side to the problems that need to be solved.
On the official sites of these two organisations, we cannot find a single hint about the future steps they will make to prevent further outrages from occurring. Various football programs on TV address the ultras organizations, trying to explain that they could have helped with extremists in the stands, but it turns out the ultras see their function in a different way. They want to drink, to shout for their favourite teams louder than any other group in the stadium, to fight and be happy to die for the team they support. The football programs appeal to the ultras, to the FFU and PFL, to the clubs’ executives to unite and stop the disorder.
One of the programs invited a militia colonel to ask for advice. The question was “Can anything be done to stop the fascism in the stands, to prevent people from fighting and drunk ultras from causing mayhem?” The colonel answered easily and his words were stunning! He said they offered to increase the number of militia men present at the matches, to make the entry to the ground stricter and apply other measures, but to his surprise most of the clubs and even the FFU declined this proposition. When they asked for the reasons, those clubs said they were ready to let the fans in with beer and stuff like this or even already drunk just to have people in the stands and earn some cash selling the tickets.
Seems like these club managers were under the influence of alcohol as well to answer like this. Moreover, the FFU said they did not want more special forces in the stadiums because it would seem like the games were held in occupied territories. These words do not sound reasonable either! After the most recent incidents in Kharkiv, Luhansk and Ohtyrka, it is quite possible that UEFA will fine the clubs and maybe even force them to play some matches in front of empty stadiums. Many journalists and players would like this to happen. They say they have tired of this regular violence and would love clubs to be forced to play the last several games in empty stadiums. That would cost them a lot of money, but what else can they do? Such clubs as Shakhtar, Arsenal Kyiv and Metalist announced they will do everything not to let drunk and aggressive fans into the stadium. Other clubs are keeping silent along with the FFU and PFL.
Of course, there were/are places where the situation is even worse than in Ukraine. Italian fans caused massacres in the streets, and Ukraine is luckily far from that. There are some key differences between Ukrainian supporters and those from other countries. During the second match between Everton and Metalist in Kharkiv, Ukrainian supporters filled the stadium completely. Everton fans were given one small section of the stand. Despite the difference in the number of the fans, the English covered almost the whole area under the stands with flags, banners and posters while Ukrainians used only scarves and small flags of Ukraine.
Moreover, the English had trumpets and used them from time to time to urge their favourite team forward. Everton fans were organised and sang and chanted in unison all the time and even bigger crowd of Ukrainians could not out sing them! It was amazing how much sound a small group of real supporters could produce! Their singing and chanting reminded many of the songs of soldiers fighting for their motherland, for their families and friends, while Ukrainians were only smoking and drinking beer nervously.
At the end when Metalist lost in a beautiful battle, the Ukrainians started shouting swear words to the English section and showing various improper gestures, expressing their resentment at the success of Everton. It lasted for about 5 minutes and all that time Everton fans were singing celebrating their club’s victory. But then something weird happened. The English noticed and understood, of course, all the gestures and words Ukrainians used to address them and stopped singing. They stopped just for a second and all supporters, like one man stated crying out in unison two phrases, one after another: “Metalist! Metalist!” and “good luck, Metalist!” for about a minute the Ukrainians were silent and the voices of the Englishmen could be heard clearly far beyond the stadium. And then all the Metalist fans that were still in the stands changed the direction of their movement and began passing by the section of Everton supporters clapping their hand and shouting “Everton!” in return. That was a very moving scene and both sides kept on exchanging the signs of gratitude until the last Ukrainian left the stands, and as a symbol of unity threw his Metalist scarf to the Everton fans.
In his interview two days later, Metalist coach Miron Markevich mentioned that event and thanked the English for giving us (Ukrainians) a lesson on how we should understand football and support our teams. Let’s hope the situation in Ukraine will improve and quite soon we will see a new country with fine football traditions!
