“We cannot continue like this in football”, protests the Minister of Sports

“We can’t continue like this in football”, protested Monday December 4 on France Inter Amélie Oudéa-Castéra, Minister of Sports and the Olympic and Paralympic Games, after the death of an FC Nantes supporter, killed during an altercation shortly before the Ligue 1 match against at OGC Nice on Saturday. Amélie Oudéa-Castéra shares her “dismay” after this new incident on the sidelines of football matches.

The minister believes that this is not “it is not possible to have law enforcement officers so overstretched, property destroyed, buses stoned, people injured and now a dead person”. Amélie Oudéa-Castéra refers here to the various incidents that have occurred in recent months. On Sunday, November 26, two Brest supporters were slightly injured by shards of glass when their bus was targeted by projectiles after their club’s victory in Montpellier. At the end of October, the Olympique Lyonnais bus was stoned before the match against Marseille, injuring OL coach Fabio Grosso and his assistant Raffaele Longo. “Basta, that’s enough”annoys Amélie Oudéa-Castéra.

The minister pleads for taking “radical measures”

If she recognizes that this phenomenon “is not specific to France”the Minister of Sports pleads for “a global response” faced with the violence that emerges on the sidelines of football matches. “A radical situation, a radical measure”, she adds. Amélie Oudéa-Castéra considers, for example, that when a “match presents a risk, we must stop for the moment on the movement of supporters”. She affirms that an initiative will be taken “with the Minister of the Interior, the Minister of Justice, the Professional Football League, the Federation and all the clubs”.