The combined Maccabi thread - now with are you going? poll

[john e]

Well you can have a go at me if you like because I posted a couple of times thinking there would be a lot more trouble than there was last night so I probably fit into the doomonger category

[Dante Lavelli]

Well you can have a go at me if you like because I posted a couple of times thinking there would be a lot more trouble than there was last night so I probably fit into the doomonger category

Tricky one as the most combustible element of the bonfire was rightly not allowed to attend.

[PeterWithe]

Burgess was a couple of years above me at school, I don't think he was a candidate for the quiz team. A fella I know married his sister.

Glad it all passed off without incident but fuck me, what did it all cost?

And very well put by Henry Winter, absolutely nails my feelings on the matter. Our reputation has been kicked all around the front pages for no good reason, glad its all over. Fuck 'em all.

[LeeB]

Ex-Albion player spreads his words of wisdom

Daryl Burgess@totalfooty

@UEFAcom @AVFCOfficial @WMPolice 🤡

By allowing who can attend this Europa League match to be dictated by a political view is a disgrace..!
@premierleague  If the same MPs decide they want the same to happen when @SpursOfficial visit Villa Park… Will their fans be banned also??

******

He sure is, and unfortunately a product of our parish mate, his folks lived opposite the Bradford Arms and he went to Park Hall

The best I can say is his sister was fit.

[Sexual Ealing]

That's very magnanimous, Lee.

[Stu]

Barney Ronay reaching in the guardian:

“Opposite the Doug Ellis Stand there was something unavoidably disturbing an hour before kick-off in the sight of 30 or 40 pro-Israel … demonstrators? Not exactly. Old age pensioners? Mainly – being retained within a caged playground for their own safety.

It will of course be overplayed in some parts as an act of oppression, because everything must now be overplayed. Clearly the police had decided this was the easiest way to maintain control of a febrile moment. It seemed to work. But still, the basic optics of placing these people inside a steel cage was undeniably strange. We’ve found you a camp. You’ll be safe here.”

https://www.theguardian.com/football/2025/nov/06/fraught-tense-and-visceral-theres-never-been-a-football-match-quite-like-maccabis-visit-to-aston-villa

[Dave]

Presumably what he's calling "a steel cage" is what most people would normally call "the fence to stop balls from the basketball court bouncing into the road" right?

God knows what insulting analogies he would have come up with had Maccabi fans been allowed to travel. "Imprisoned in the ghetto of the away end, the high walls of Villa Park segregating the Maccabi supporters, kept away from the rest of society by stewards, their hi-vis jackets redolent of the tunics of the Ordnungspolizei..."

[Somniloquism]

It does look cage like if they were in the sports court.

[rob_bridge]

So we lost couple hundred grand in revenue and did we have to pay for the enhanced police presence.

[PeterWithesShin]

The police did a great job. Keeping them on opposite sides of the ground worked well, even if a couple did show what twats they are by going on to Trinity Rd to deliberately goad the pro-Palestine folks by waving the Israeli flag in front of them. I reckon it being well publicised how big a presence the police kept the numbers on both sides much lower than expected. And without having the numbers neither side, especially Tommy's Twats weren't going to start shit.

Shame some of ours tried giving it the big one but as always people are brave when there's a load of police keeping you safe.

[Clampy]

Yeah, it was excellently policed, well done to them. I stood on Trinity Road for around half hour or so and didn't feel concerned for my safety or intimidated once, although glady I missed the Tommy Yaxley-Lennon twats who predictably turned up tossing about their god. What an embarrassment they are.

[Percy McCarthy]

Police arrested six people before the match started, three on suspicion of racially-aggravated public order offences.

From the Beeb

I believe 2 were also for not listening to police (1 a YouTuber) and 1 for public disorder.

There were less arrests than on Bonfire night.

[Chris Smith]

In 50+ years of going to Villa Park I have never seen a police operation on that scale. Besides that the only difference to a normal match day for us was being directed to the Trinity Road side of the Holte End.

[Brend'Watkins]

That plane that sounded like a ‘doodlebug’ circling the ground after the game had finished, what was that all about? Why not the usual helicopter?

[PeterWithesShin]

Yesterday showed how easily disinformation can spread. A favourite was a photo of the Villa team coach at the Hyatt and loads of people saying that it was there to get the Maccabi team to the ground safely. Even when told Villa always stay there before a home game some wouldn't have it.