V.League 2018: Don't let the innocent suffer for the guilty.
(Baonghean.vn) - After many days of waiting, the V.League 2018 has begun. Besides the impressive professional quality and the increased number of spectators compared to the opening day of the 2017 season, the biggest "highlight" of the opening day was the Hải Phòng fans setting off flares at Hàng Đẫy Stadium.
This was considered an excessive and violent act by some of the visiting Hai Phong fans. Not only did they light flares in the stands, but they also threw them onto the pitch, causing the match between the home team Hanoi and the visiting team Hai Phong to be interrupted.
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| This is considered an excessive act by Hai Phong fans. Photo: Internet |
However, in the end, the tournament organizers only issued a 20 million VND fine to Hai Phong Club and a similar fine to the Hang Day Stadium organizers, without mentioning any punishment for the person who lit the flares.
Remember, in the 2017 season, Hai Phong fans repeatedly threw flares onto the My Dinh stadium pitch and were banned by the organizers from attending away matches for the remainder of the season. However, this penalty became a "farce" because in subsequent matches, Hai Phong fans continued to attend away games without any further punishment. Meanwhile, the stadium organizers who allowed the flare incident to occur were penalized for "failing to ensure the safety and security of the match."
On forums and fan club pages of several clubs, it has been suggested that the V.League organizing committee needs clear regulations to handle and specifically hold accountable individuals who engage in excessive behavior, avoiding vague penalties such as "banning fan clubs," "fining fan clubs," or penalizing stadium organizers or teams, while the violations are caused by a few overzealous individuals.
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| The fan club believes that general punishments should be avoided, and that specific responsibility should be assigned to each individual. (Image: Internet) |
As true Hai Phong fans say: These are people who want to show off in the name of the fan club. We cannot ban all Hai Phong fans because of a few such individuals. These cases need to be dealt with severely to prevent "a rotten apple from spoiling the barrel."
According to experts, to prevent a recurrence of unruly fans setting off flares and causing disorder in the stands, the tournament organizers and stadium organizers must install surveillance cameras in the stands, along with the control of law enforcement to quickly identify those engaging in unruly behavior and handle them appropriately, thus rectifying this situation.
Otherwise, the situation, from setting off flares to brawls in the stands between unruly fans of different teams during crucial matches of the season, will become complicated and unpredictable.
And importantly, if we keep imposing vague and inappropriate penalties, it will lead to a "everyone gets off scot-free," failing to deter unruly fans.
Meanwhile, in some foreign football leagues – where there are many unruly fans, known as football hooligans – even they are intimidated by the strictness of the league organizers.
Accordingly, the organizers of these tournaments believe that the use of flares and smoke bombs in the stands could affect the safety and lives of other fans, so those who engage in such behavior will be immediately arrested and banned from attending matches for many years. Therefore, these hooligans almost never dare to cause trouble in the stands, and at most, they only dare to fight on the way home!