Hillsborough - Twenty years on

For a long time if I went out on the ale I'd return home crying. I've never had flashbacks of specific events haunting me; it was the taste of the sorrow and the horror and the impact on all of us that bothered me and the injustice of the subsequent legal processes. I've always had that special relationship that mums and sons have and I know that the son she had who left that morning for the match never came home. I feel that worst for her. It bothered her that she hadn't been there to say goodbye to me that fateful morning.

You expect the truth. You're brought up to think British is best and when you find out it isn't it hurts and you feel betrayed. You don't expect those in power to be anything other than fair and not to have an agenda - coz that's their job - but they do. I'm sure that around the country most people would correctly say when asked that failure of police control was the overwhelming cause of the disaster. However there are some out there who don't know the truth and the ticketless and drunken fans lies that were fed by the Scum suits them perfectly. How could they do this to us? Why? I can't go back as far as the blitz in Word War II but this is certainly our generation's darkest hour. This is why an unreserved apology – and not the half lecture we recently got about moving on – is so important. They should put out banner headlines, make it the first item on the national 6 o'clock news and say it was lies, telling everybody who ever believed any of this shite should wise up – period. They should make it plain that it was lies. That's lies, not a mistake… but lies! Only then would we even have anything to talk about you godless bastards.

read the full article: http://www.contrast.org/hillsborough/history/kav.shtm

then hang your heads in shame

Awful waste of life. God rest their souls. RIP.

Eighthours wrote:
Hexx wrote:
Eighthours wrote:But no, it was the mass ticketless drunken mob wot done it!

Oddly enough the Taylor Review said that was a contributing factor as well. (Weren't you the one complaining that people were seeing this in Black/White?)

Yes I was. Please point out where satirising Ladybayred's argument means that I think this is a black and white issue.

And as I have said in this thread, the stadium, police and ticketless fans are all partly to blame. I have been very vociferous on the subject and I appologise for over stepping the mark with some of the things I have said but my point and the point I have been trying to make all along is that the Liverpool fans without tickets need to take substantial blame for the situation.

Taken from a piece published in the guardian on Monday April 17, 1989:

Logic suggests that Liverpool should not have been allocated that end of Hillsborough at all but should have been allowed to fill the huge expanse of terracing at the Penistone Road end. Yet for the second year running Nottingham Forest, with an average home attendance of just over 21,000, were allocated 28,000 tickets and spread themselves across the Spion Kop, while Liverpool, whose average gate is nearer 40,000, were given 24,000 and a comparatively cramped enclosure.

Yet Mr Rogan Taylor, Liverpudlian head of the Football Supporters' Association, argued that the organisers should have taken differing strengths of support into account.

"Anyone who knows Liverpool fans should have realised that in this situation thousands would turn up without tickets. If you don't take support into account you are lighting the blue touch paper."

This is what get my goat about it. Liverpool fans blaming the fact they were given less tickets is partially to blame for the event. If Liverpool had gotten 1 ticket for the game and 3 people turned up and caused a crush, the two without tickets are to blame for the crush and had been reckless in turning up and trying to force there way in. As the quote above from Rogan Taylor points out, thousands of ticketless Liverpool fans turned up and in my opinion were acting recklessly that day and they should be blamed at least equally if not more so then the police.

ladybayred wrote: in my opinion were acting recklessly that day and they should be blamed at least equally if not more so then the police.

But that's not what the Taylor Report said. Or the police themselves now. Your opinion isn't shared by those who have actually seen all the evidence, or those were there in that end of the ground - and that includes the non-Liverpool-fan journos.

Eighthours wrote:
ladybayred wrote: in my opinion were acting recklessly that day and they should be blamed at least equally if not more so then the police.

But that's not what the Taylor Report said. Or the police themselves now. Your opinion isn't shared by those who have actually seen all the evidence, or those were there in that end of the ground - and that includes the non-Liverpool-fan journos.

One problem which creates difficulties for the police is the arrival of would-be spectators without
tickets at an all-ticket match. Although I found there was not a large body of such fans at Hillsborough there
undoubtedly were some. At other matches the numbers have not only been large; they have been determined
to gain entrance by one means or another. If they could not acquire tickets at the ground they have created so
much trouble that the police have judged it best to let them in. Sometimes this has been for payment; on
occasions, even free. The rationale has been that it is better to have troublemakers inside the ground where
they can be monitored than roaming round the town at large. Obviously, the practice of admitting fans
without tickets has a bad knock-on effect. Bands of fans unable to get tickets believe that if they turn up and
create sufficient clamour the police will admit them.

Ok, so Turner's report suggests there was no large body of such fans at Hillsborough. I'd like to know how he estimated this and what he deems to be a large body of fans. In my previous post I quoted Mr Rogan Taylor, Liverpudlian head of the Football Supporters' Association, who's estimates of thousands seem to contravene with what the report states (not a fact as to the actual numbers I know). If Liverpool fans were known for turning up in there thousands without tickets for games, why would that not happen in a cup semi-final against one of their then rivals? Even if the figures are unclear, there clearly were ticketless fans forcing their way into the ground, which only made the situation worse and thus they should take some of the blame.

ladybayred wrote:Even if the figures are unclear, there clearly were ticketless fans forcing their way into the ground, which only made the situation worse and thus they should take some of the blame.

The presence of ticketless fans has to be established as a cause of the crush before any blame can be apportioned to them. And this has to be at least partly set against whether the police's actions in opening the gate and not being organised enough to direct fans to emptier parts of the ground would have caused a similar crush even without there being any such ticketless fans. The likelihood of this seems high, so whether those fans contributed to the disaster ending up worse depends on whether their numbers were enough to effect a change in the level of crush, and therefore the level of fatalities.

As nobody has precisely nailed down the number of fans without tickets, assigning any of the blame to them at this point would be a bit of a crapshoot, surely.

PostRe: Hillsborough - Twenty years on by **SEP** » Wed Apr 15, 2009 4:15 pm

Shadow wrote:Also, if I'd travelled 80 miles hoping to get a ticket for the match, but ended up without one, I know that I'd definitely take the opportunity to just walk into the ground if the police opened the gates. Especially back then when you wouldn't have had the worry of having to find a seat.

And all of you would do the same too.

Personally, I wouldn't travel 80 miles in the vague hope of obtaining a ticket.

PostRe: Hillsborough - Twenty years on by KK » Wed Apr 15, 2009 4:41 pm

Well everyone got it with both Barrels at the Hillsborough Anniversary. Andy Burnham (Secretary for Culture) got booed out of the place, as did Gordon Brown when he was mentioned, Kelvin MackEnzie, "The Scum", the internet...

A rather unnecessarily bitter affair in places, I thought.

PostRe: Hillsborough - Twenty years on by **LewisD** » Wed Apr 15, 2009 5:07 pm

Skipped from page 2, so I dunno if this is still relevent to the ongoing discussion.
Last night our darts team were playing at a working mans club (away) and they had a telly on for the football.

Now, most of our team are Chelsea fans (I'm a neutral supporter of football, citing Celtic as my team of choice if asked).
Most of the working man's club were Liverpool fans.

So when Liverpool went 2-0 up, they started chanting anti-chelsea songs.
To which my mate Mark fired up the classic "You kill your own fans."

Long story short, we nearly had a club-full fight until I broke it all up by being cool as ice and started singing Anti-Tottenham songs.
Everyone seemed to go absolutely silent and started joining in, smiling and clinking glasses.

I was truly a hero that night.

Tottenham Hotspur went to Rome to see the Pope....
Tottenham Hotspur went to Rome to see the Pope......
Tottenham Hotspur went to Rome to see the Pope......

And this is what he said: !

Your mate is not a wise man, Lew.

PostRe: Hillsborough - Twenty years on by **LewisD** » Wed Apr 15, 2009 5:10 pm

Well he is, just not when it comes to Football.

He's very much into his club-fan rivalrys. Fortunately drawing the line at Hooliganism.

Dab hand at riot incitement though!

What the Sun did back then was f**ked up sensationalism, good thing that many people in Liverpool still dont buy that rag that tries to call itself a newspaper.

RIP to the 96

PostRe: Hillsborough - Twenty years on by **PCCD** » Wed Apr 15, 2009 6:34 pm

KKLEIN wrote:Well everyone got it with both Barrels at the Hillsborough Anniversary. Andy Burnham (Secretary for Culture) got booed out of the place, as did Gordon Brown when he was mentioned, Kelvin MackEnzie, "The Scum", the internet...

A rather unnecessarily bitter affair in places, I thought.

I must admit I did start laughing when they started on Burnham.

So when Liverpool went 2-0 up, they started chanting anti-chelsea songs.
To which my mate Mark fired up the classic "You kill your own fans."

You stupid boy

KKLEIN wrote:Well everyone got it with both Barrels at the Hillsborough Anniversary. Andy Burnham (Secretary for Culture) got booed out of the place, as did Gordon Brown when he was mentioned, Kelvin MackEnzie, "The Scum", the internet...

A rather unnecessarily bitter affair in places, I thought.

You have heard of Liverpool before? Right?

I went to Anfield today for the memorial service and it was clear that they didn't expect so many to turn out and show their support to the families of the victims.

I'm not going to re-join the debate that took place in here today. There are clearly some people who have made up their mind about the events of that day 20 years ago and without looking at the facts, are happy to make a false judgement.

What I will add however, is that the poster ladybayred has said some absolutely disgusting and shocking things in pages much previous to this one. How he can do so and claim that his Dad was at the other end that day, I don't know. It is calling Liverpool fans 'murderers' and laying the blame at us that made the events even more difficult to take in the aftermath. Thankfully, enough people have made the effort to try and correct him and show to anybody who was reading and unsure of what the Hillsborough tragedy was, that other things went wrong that day.

It was especially good to see a group of Celtic fans make the journey to Anfield and unveil two big flags that were displayed on the pitch.

It was not just about Liverpool fans. That tragic loss of life could have happened to any set of supporters that day and thankfully changes were put in place to prevent it from happening again. For anybody who has the interest or the time (I will be recording The Apprentice tonight), there will be a drama on tonight at 9pm on ITV3 which shows a re-act of what went on and it truely is touching.

PostRe: Hillsborough - Twenty years on by **LewisD** » Wed Apr 15, 2009 8:28 pm

If you have Sky anytime, or access to the History Channel tonight at 9 (?) you can catch their "Hillsborough Remembered" documentry.

This thing on ITV3 is brilliant if its what I saw a few years back. It's a bit like a drama film, re-acting the day of a small group of fans but done with taste.

Jus Luke wrote:This thing on ITV3 is brilliant if its what I saw a few years back. It's a bit like a drama film, re-acting the day of a small group of fans but done with taste.

watching it at the moment, this is why standing terraces SHOULD NOT be allowed again.

Cyburn2 wrote:
Jus Luke wrote:This thing on ITV3 is brilliant if its what I saw a few years back. It's a bit like a drama film, re-acting the day of a small group of fans but done with taste.

watching it at the moment, this is why standing terraces SHOULD NOT be allowed again.

If you've ever experienced being in a crowd at a large football ground when a goal is scored...Jaysus. I remember being in the Kippax in my youth and literally getting carried 20 rows forward when we scored.

Hillsborough - Twenty years on

Who is online

Affiliates