in the stands, an unbearable season

Player assaulted, field invasions, throwing of projectiles, procrastination by the authorities… After several years of progress in the management of football supporters – with more dialogue and fewer incidents – French football has fallen back into its ways this season. Blame it on an endless series of incidents that punctuated the first part of the exercise, before the institutions turned on themselves. Throwback to an unbearable year in the stands.

From the first day, the tone was set at the Stade de la Mosson in Montpellier, where the Marseillais Valentin Rongier was targeted while he was warming up at the edge of the lawn. The OM midfielder received a bottle thrown from the stands, which caused the match to be interrupted, and the closure of two Montpellier stands for three games. The first incident of a long series of projectile throwing.

In Nice, during the third day, it was Dimitri Payet who was targeted by Nice supporters, before several dozen of them invaded the field to do battle, even physically attacking the Reunionese. Stopped in the 75th minute when Nice were leading 1-0, the match was replayed on neutral ground behind closed doors (1-1), after the Niçois were penalized with a one-point withdrawal (without which they would have finished fourth in the championship…).

A few weeks later, on November 21 in Lyon, Dimitri Payet was again hit by a bottle from the stands of Groupama Stadium. This had also caused the meeting to be stopped there, after endless procrastination in the hallways of the stadium, and a match to be replayed behind closed doors. A scenario that pushed the authorities to finally adopt a clear protocol of 30 minutes maximum to decide the fate of a meeting.

A spectacle that we have seen repeated too often this season, whether in Ligue 1 but also at the lower level, during Ajaccio-Niort on September 21, or between supporters as during Metz-PSG the next day. Parisians who, a month later, also spent a complicated evening at the Stade Vélodrome, during the Classic against OM. Projectiles rained down on the PSG players at each corner, before Payet tried to calm the crowd. No need to continue the list of incidents, the observation is clear: their number has exploded this season.

But it wasn’t just the projectiles that were the problem. Lhe return of land invasions also struck a chord. In addition to the sad Nice example mentioned above, the Lens-Lille derby, which took place in mid-September, saw Lensois ultras descend on the field from their stands to defend supporters attacked by park ultras Lille. The game resumed 30 minutes late.

Four days later, in Angers, the scene repeated itself between Angevin and Marseille supporters. The latter, fed up with receiving all kinds of projectiles and firecrackers thrown by the opponents, left their parking lot to go do battle after the final whistle. A symptomatic example of the renewed violence of a certain fringe, minority but visible, of the supporters. Another illustration, in Ligue 2: the altercation between Khalid Boutaïb, striker from Le Havre, and a Norman supporter during a meeting against Toulouse, still in September.

A violence that we also found outside the stadiums, with fights (fights planned or not between hooligans of different clubs) more and more numerous, although the majority are not publicized. Fights have often broken out, such as the brawl preceding Montpellier-Bordeaux leaving 16 injured, including six hospitalized. We also remember the sad spectacle in the stands of the Charléty stadium during the 32nd final of the Coupe de France between Paris FC and Lyon, in January.

Despite the Sports Minister’s call for individual sanctions at the beginning of December, the authorities tightened the screws in the second half of the season by multiplying collective sanctions, prohibiting most supporter travel. Result: the end of the championship was much calmer, in appearance. The only turmoil observed comes more from protests by supporters against the leaders of their club, and/or the results.

In Saint-Etienne, where the season has not been rosy, the stands have also been talked about, especially during Saint-Etienne-Monaco, on April 23. That evening, the Green Angels – an ultra-Stéphanois group – celebrated their 30th anniversary with ostentation. The fireworks fired from the stand caused the interruption of the meeting. But we are talking about a pyrotechnic show that is a little too demonstrative, and not a dispute comparable to that which caused the end of the Nancy-Quevilly meeting, provoked the day before by the Nancy fans, desperate by the situation of their club. . Finally, the last days of the championship were marked by the case of Nice-Saint-Etienne, with a song mocking the death of Emiliano Sala descended from the stands of Nice.

The figures for the season bear witness to an extraordinary exercise, with 11 pronounced closed sessions, 35 closures of stands, 24 closures of parking lots, and 130 travel bans. A year to forget for French football, but above all to analyze well, so as not to see it happen again.