Roughest grounds you've been too and biggest scraps!

[Churchill123]

Arrived at Euston to go to Spurs once and we got sussed straight away (these lads were fucking huge), was threatened with all sorts if we went to the game. Got on the tube and then decided to fuck the game off!!

7 pages in and at last someone mentions this fucking shit hole of a place. You get the train and your farmed off to Seven Sisters and have to do the fucking Long March where you get it from all sides up Tottenham High Road or whatever the fuck it is called.

Alternatively you get the coach and they land you on a bit of an industrial estate which leads you straight onto what Broadwater Farm or some other such fucking shit hole. You then wind up outside the Spurs end - nice.

Nothing but fucking chaos every time I've been to Spurs. Hate it with a passion.

Stoke is awful too. Remember going to the Boxing Day fancy dress. Horrendous!

And of course, the swamp.

I remember speaking with a couple of lads at west ham this season (really nice chaps) and was asking them if west ham are as mad as there reputation and they basically said 80's etc yes but nowdays not so much... but they did say if you went to an away day wanting trouble 99 times out of 100 you could find that trouble.. but if you just wanted to have a few pints enjoy the game and not have any bother then nowdays you'd be perfectly safe too

With it being far more lively in the 80's and people kicking off far more than nowdays, did kids go to games like they do nowdays, or was it too dangerous?

 

[Rösler von Stretfordbömber]

I don't know whether to be glad that I missed some of that madness from the 70's and 80's, or whether I wish I'd been old enough to be in the mix for that.

Had some pretty narrow escapes at Boro. That place was bad. Six-finger land was reliably rough, even after the heyday of the Naughty Forty.

 

[Anonymous]

Arrived at Euston to go to Spurs once and we got sussed straight away (these lads were fucking huge), was threatened with all sorts if we went to the game. Got on the tube and then decided to fuck the game off!!

7 pages in and at last someone mentions this fucking shit hole of a place. You get the train and your farmed off to Seven Sisters and have to do the fucking Long March where you get it from all sides up Tottenham High Road or whatever the fuck it is called.

Alternatively you get the coach and they land you on a bit of an industrial estate which leads you straight onto what Broadwater Farm or some other such fucking shit hole. You then wind up outside the Spurs end - nice.

Nothing but fucking chaos every time I've been to Spurs. Hate it with a passion.

Stoke is awful too. Remember going to the Boxing Day fancy dress. Horrendous!

And of course, the swamp.

I remember speaking with a couple of lads at west ham this season (really nice chaps) and was asking them if west ham are as mad as there reputation and they basically said 80's etc yes but nowdays not so much... but they did say if you went to an away day wanting trouble 99 times out of 100 you could find that trouble.. but if you just wanted to have a few pints enjoy the game and not have any bother then nowdays you'd be perfectly safe too

With it being far more lively in the 80's and people kicking off far more than nowdays, did kids go to games like they do nowdays, or was it too dangerous?

Very much more family oriented now. Don't recall seeing too many nippers at the games I've mentioned. Then again, you look at grounds/facilities now and it's like visiting The Dorchester by comparison. The atmosphere has suffered as a result, but certainly a change for the better.

 

[rastus]

Always felt secure when the Cool Cats were around, sort of followed them 10 paces behind, they were my heros at that time all in long leather coats never spoke to 1 of them as I wasn't cool enough hahhaa

 

[lunebleu]

Not the roughest or the biggest scrap but perhaps the most bizarre and unexpected. Oxford United away. We lost. Coming out of the ground with the Mrs and having to walk through a line of policemen with riot shields. Don't know why because there had been no evidence of trouble but I suspect they hadn't many big city clubs there so were a little hyped-up. Anyway, got to the car park and just about to sit in it---then a tap on the shoulder. I Turned round and a bloke in a suit smacks me in face. " Tosser" was all I heard and than he was gone. I'm thinking this is fucking Oxford--'City of dreaming Spires' and all that---- what was that all about? !! -- Nose bleeding,wife crying and stuck in a clogged up car park. Surreal. Never thought about reporting it the police,as a Harpurhey lad you tend to take these things in your stride. We got away from the ground about 6-00pm with the wife moaning about the blood on the upholstery. Happy days.

 

[Tbilisi]

League Cup Semi Final Away to Liverpool 1981. Vibe of true danger in the air.

Biggest punch up I saw was at Peterborough in the FA Cup run the same year. A load of local yokel farmer types finally succumbed outside a chippy to the City hordes after they had jumped on a City fan further up the road...on a bridge if my memory still works.

Was that where the City fan had took a bit of a kick in on the way out on a car park with his mates slagging City fans off for doing nothing and then more and more Blues gathered round these PBoro fans until they just dissapeared under a load of punches,same one?

Cant ever forget Gerry Gow walking to the train station that day with it all kicking off in a supermarket across the road,he honestly didnt give a fcuk.

Yeah could well be...we sort of ran at them to get them off the this City fan then loads of others joined in and somebody ran out of a chippy and whacked one of them over the head with a portion of the finest pie, chips and gravy. Somebody had ripped his trouser leg off. Bizarre spectacle.

Been to virtually every game mentioned on this thread from 1976. I am old.

Being of similar vintage been to quite a few of them but moved from Manc(Denton via Gorton our family) to Sheffield when I was 8 so was harder to get to games from there.

The 70s and 80s were a nightmare really for away games for every club.They all hated coming to Maine Road on a bad day.Remember City played SWFC at MR in a League Cup game 2nd leg(79 I think)and a Wednesday fan from Oughtibridge got his eye taken out with a bike chain,was in all the Sheffield papers,felt ashamed to be Blue that day.

-- Mon May 20, 2013 11:50 pm --

7 pages in and at last someone mentions this fucking shit hole of a place. You get the train and your farmed off to Seven Sisters and have to do the fucking Long March where you get it from all sides up Tottenham High Road or whatever the fuck it is called.

Alternatively you get the coach and they land you on a bit of an industrial estate which leads you straight onto what Broadwater Farm or some other such fucking shit hole. You then wind up outside the Spurs end - nice.

Nothing but fucking chaos every time I've been to Spurs. Hate it with a passion.

Stoke is awful too. Remember going to the Boxing Day fancy dress. Horrendous!

And of course, the swamp.

I remember speaking with a couple of lads at west ham this season (really nice chaps) and was asking them if west ham are as mad as there reputation and they basically said 80's etc yes but nowdays not so much... but they did say if you went to an away day wanting trouble 99 times out of 100 you could find that trouble.. but if you just wanted to have a few pints enjoy the game and not have any bother then nowdays you'd be perfectly safe too

With it being far more lively in the 80's and people kicking off far more than nowdays, did kids go to games like they do nowdays, or was it too dangerous?

Very much more family oriented now. Don't recall seeing too many nippers at the games I've mentioned. Then again, you look at grounds/facilities now and it's like visiting The Dorchester by comparison. The atmosphere has suffered as a result, but certainly a change for the better.

Hardly any women at games in those days,that is something that has happened only just the last few years.

 

[The Road Sweeper]

Cardiff in the cup as already mentioned.

They were 1-0 up with about 5 minutes to go and we saw quite a lot of their fans start to leave. Didn't think much of it till the police opened the gates to let us out and they were all stood there waiting for us.

That was a weird one that. Normally there would be at least some distance between the waiting home fans and the exits for the away fans, but at Cardiff it was just one big melee as soon as you walked through the gates.

My mate got lamped as soon as we stepped through the gate, in the "confussion" afterwards I found myself alone, isolated and getting the "thousand yard stares" from several rabid welshman!!

i decided discretion was better than valour and walked straight towards them instead of away from them muttering something about English bastards. It worked!!

The only problem was that I was going in the opposite way to the train station and it took ages to get there the long way round. By the time I did get there a big mob had gathered outside looking for City fans entering.

I didn't fancy wading through, so I went to a nearby Boots shop, bought some shampoo and insisted on a shopping bag to carry it in. I then bought a copy of the local paper, folding it to clearly show the title and carried that in my other hand.

Once kitted out with my "I'm a local" disguise, I breezed through and strolled deliberately on to the wrong platform as the Manchester bound platform was crawling with Cardiff. I sat down on a bench and read the paper hoping to fuck nobody would talk to me.

When my train came in, I waited to the last minute, got to the right platform, jumped on the train and collapsed in a seat!!

 

[WestGorton]

Was that where the City fan had took a bit of a kick in on the way out on a car park with his mates slagging City fans off for doing nothing and then more and more Blues gathered round these PBoro fans until they just dissapeared under a load of punches,same one?

Cant ever forget Gerry Gow walking to the train station that day with it all kicking off in a supermarket across the road,he honestly didnt give a fcuk.

Yeah could well be...we sort of ran at them to get them off the this City fan then loads of others joined in and somebody ran out of a chippy and whacked one of them over the head with a portion of the finest pie, chips and gravy. Somebody had ripped his trouser leg off. Bizarre spectacle.

Been to virtually every game mentioned on this thread from 1976. I am old.

Being of similar vintage been to quite a few of them but moved from Manc(Denton via Gorton our family) to Sheffield when I was 8 so was harder to get to games from there.

The 70s and 80s were a nightmare really for away games for every club.They all hated coming to Maine Road on a bad day.Remember City played SWFC at MR in a Legue Cup game 2nd leg(79 I think)and a Wednesday fan from Oughtibridge got his eye taken out with a bike chain,was in all the Sheffield papers,felt ashamed to be Blue that day.

I was at that game versus Wednesday too...agree....think it was 1979. Think we won 2-1 with a late goal.

 

[waterloo blue]

Shrewsbury in the cup and blues handcuffed to the railings around the cop shop.
Leeds,I was 12 and we lost to the them,Cherry scored and for my troubles I was kicked in the stomach by a real hard skinhead type.My dad kicked him unconscious,outside the greyhound stadium.
Millwall,Adcock scored and we encountered a load of knuckle draggers at London Bridge Station,never been so relieved in my life to see the police.
Barnsley in the cup in the late 70's,saw a car on it's roof in a car showroom and we turned the corner and it was pandemonium.
Newcastle 83,two of my mates hospitalised and if I wasn't wearing a leather jacket,I would of been scarred for life ,after my back was slashed.
It could happen anywhere and for no reason,anyone who reckons they could avoid it is kidding themselves on.

 

[craigsteel]

Full scale pitched battle between City and South Yorkshire Police under stand at Oakwell,Barnsley. There were no holding back, plenty of claret about. Coppers were well out of order, smashing owt that moved with batons