jimhancot
02-04-08, 12:26 PM
Just for Cartman! ;)
Bit long, and unfortunately no scans, but it gets my message across:
http://linfieldexile.blogspot.com/2008/04/anti-linfield-witchhunt-2008-style.html
At around 3.30pm on Saturday after the conclusion of the Linfield- Cliftonville Irish Cup game, and the Rangers-Celtic Old Firm game, 2 men were injured in Belfast city centre after an altercation outside a (Nationalist) pub, one seriously after being stabbed in the neck with a bottle. It was an apparently unprovoked, premeditated assault, which I thoroughly condemn, and one from which I hope both men make a quick recovery. Photos from the scene can be viewed on Press Eye.
It didn’t take long for Sinn Fein to apportion blame on Linfield fans:
Sinn Féin said the trouble was started by a crowd of Linfield supporters.
Sinn Féin assembly member Paul Maskey said: "I urge people not to get involved in any retaliation. The people who carried this out need to be ashamed of themselves. They need to be arrested and put behind bars for a very long time." [oh the irony]
The next day, though, it turned really ugly, with the Sunday World and Sunday Life indulging in some disgracefully sensationalist journalism, leaving it in no doubt that it was rampaging bigoted Linfield fans who were responsible.
The Sunday World’s headline read:
Fenian Hating of football club Linfield, known as the Blues
In an instant undoing all the good and tireless work the club has been doing for years to try to eradicate the stigma long given to Linfield fans as intolerant, bigoted and anti-Catholic. This despite the fact that the likes of Paul McAreavey, Aidan O’Kane and Michael Gault are among the most popular players with the fans at Linfield FC.
The Guardian, a well-known nationalist rag, published the following sensationalist article:
A Celtic fan was seriously ill in hospital last night after his throat was slashed during a mass loyalist attack on a pub in central Belfast. The supporter was set upon by a mob of up to 70 Linfield fans returning from yesterday's Irish Cup semi-final clash with Cliftonville at The Oval.
Eyewitnesses in Castle Street - a mainly nationalist thoroughfare - said that at around 3.30pm the Linfield supporters alighted from a bus and rushed towards the area.
At first the mob tried to get into the Belfast Bar at the junction of Castle Street and King Street, but were repelled by up to 100 customers who had been watching the Celtic-Rangers Old Firm match on television.
'It was after the Linfield crowd were beaten back from the bar that they singled out a guy in King Street,' said one witness. 'They knew he was Catholic because of his Celtic shirt.'
A spokesman for the Police Service of Northern Ireland confirmed they had to deal with serious disturbances in central Belfast yesterday and that one man had had his throat cut. Up to eight PSNI jeeps were still patrolling the area late yesterday afternoon.
Leading Sinn Fein figures, including a former Lord Mayor of Belfast, Alex Maskey, and Bobby Storey, a former IRA prisoner and confidant of Gerry Adams, arrived at the scene shortly after to calm rising tensions.
The next day, Stephen Nolan couldn’t wait to stick the boot in, blaming Linfield fans and the sectarianism and violence inherent in local football for the trouble, wondering why Linfield fans didn’t have tighter ticketing restrictions placed on them before the game (a totally fatuous and irrelevant argument, seeing as the violence took place over an hour later, miles away from the game) and calling for tighter controls on Linfield fans, despite them being the most restricted and controlled in the country.
When eyewitness accounts from 1) a man in the pub on the day in question, and 2) a passing taxi driver revealed that there were NO Linfield or for that matter red/white/blue colours on the persons of the gang involved, only people wearing typical casual/ hooligan gear, ie dark colours, faces covered, Stone Island clothing etc, Sinn Fein and Stephen Nolan backtracked, making themselves look ridiculous in the process.
1. Sinn Fein changed their story to allege that in fact the attackers were wearing Linfield SCARVES. Aha. So, notwithstanding the fact that you had originally alleged that Linfield shirts were on display, you’re now totally disregarding the widely-known fact that football firms don’t wear colours and saying that the eyesight of the (SF) witnesses were that good that they could see the words ‘Linfield FC’ on a red/white/blue scarf? Dead on.
2. Nolan changed tack, seemingly realising that Linfield fans and Linfield FC weren’t responsible for the trouble, and went on the attack with regards to a well-known Linfield FC song apparently glorifying violence, “Hatchets and Hammers”. Obviously, having been made to look silly in his original line of attack, he’d dug and shitstirred to find anything else possibly linked to Saturday’s events, and found that Linfield fans sang the following song:
My old man, said be a Linfield fan
And don’t dilly dally on the way
We took the Oval in half a minute
We took Coleraine and all that’s in it
With hatchets and hammers, Stanley knives and spanners
We’ll show the b*stards how to fight!
If you can’t beat a Glenman in half a minute
Then you’re not a Linfield fan.
Slightly violent admittedly, but then football fans are tribal and posturing, and this song has been doing the rounds for 40+ years, during the whole course of the Troubles, without anyone insulting mine and other people’s intelligence by suggesting that it incites football fans to violence. Ban Rocky! Ban Eastenders! Ban any TV violence, otherwise I’m going to go out and stab someone! Wise up.
Nolan then revealed that a similar version of the song is available on the ‘Windsor Roar’ music CD in the club shop, and that by implication, Linfield FC are partly responsible for the violence! What a crock. The Windsor Roar initiative was established to raise funds for the club and to help create a noisy, non-sectarian atmosphere inside Windsor Park. His allegations would be taken more seriously by myself and others if it weren’t for the fact that he is a Glentoran fan. He even said on the radio that he’d be at next Monday’s Setanta game at the Oval between Glentoran and Linfield. Hopefully he’ll be welcomed with big licks of ‘Hatchets and Hammers’, and have a few suitable songs and banners aimed at him. All in the interests of non-violence, of course. They're gunning for the Forum 'Hatchets and Hammers' too. Good luck with that boys.
Strange too that Nolan hasn't got onto Manchester United about their singing of this song and claiming of it as their own:
http://www.tshirtsunited.com/sale/tshirts/hatchetsandhammers.html
Bit long, and unfortunately no scans, but it gets my message across:
http://linfieldexile.blogspot.com/2008/04/anti-linfield-witchhunt-2008-style.html
At around 3.30pm on Saturday after the conclusion of the Linfield- Cliftonville Irish Cup game, and the Rangers-Celtic Old Firm game, 2 men were injured in Belfast city centre after an altercation outside a (Nationalist) pub, one seriously after being stabbed in the neck with a bottle. It was an apparently unprovoked, premeditated assault, which I thoroughly condemn, and one from which I hope both men make a quick recovery. Photos from the scene can be viewed on Press Eye.
It didn’t take long for Sinn Fein to apportion blame on Linfield fans:
Sinn Féin said the trouble was started by a crowd of Linfield supporters.
Sinn Féin assembly member Paul Maskey said: "I urge people not to get involved in any retaliation. The people who carried this out need to be ashamed of themselves. They need to be arrested and put behind bars for a very long time." [oh the irony]
The next day, though, it turned really ugly, with the Sunday World and Sunday Life indulging in some disgracefully sensationalist journalism, leaving it in no doubt that it was rampaging bigoted Linfield fans who were responsible.
The Sunday World’s headline read:
Fenian Hating of football club Linfield, known as the Blues
In an instant undoing all the good and tireless work the club has been doing for years to try to eradicate the stigma long given to Linfield fans as intolerant, bigoted and anti-Catholic. This despite the fact that the likes of Paul McAreavey, Aidan O’Kane and Michael Gault are among the most popular players with the fans at Linfield FC.
The Guardian, a well-known nationalist rag, published the following sensationalist article:
A Celtic fan was seriously ill in hospital last night after his throat was slashed during a mass loyalist attack on a pub in central Belfast. The supporter was set upon by a mob of up to 70 Linfield fans returning from yesterday's Irish Cup semi-final clash with Cliftonville at The Oval.
Eyewitnesses in Castle Street - a mainly nationalist thoroughfare - said that at around 3.30pm the Linfield supporters alighted from a bus and rushed towards the area.
At first the mob tried to get into the Belfast Bar at the junction of Castle Street and King Street, but were repelled by up to 100 customers who had been watching the Celtic-Rangers Old Firm match on television.
'It was after the Linfield crowd were beaten back from the bar that they singled out a guy in King Street,' said one witness. 'They knew he was Catholic because of his Celtic shirt.'
A spokesman for the Police Service of Northern Ireland confirmed they had to deal with serious disturbances in central Belfast yesterday and that one man had had his throat cut. Up to eight PSNI jeeps were still patrolling the area late yesterday afternoon.
Leading Sinn Fein figures, including a former Lord Mayor of Belfast, Alex Maskey, and Bobby Storey, a former IRA prisoner and confidant of Gerry Adams, arrived at the scene shortly after to calm rising tensions.
The next day, Stephen Nolan couldn’t wait to stick the boot in, blaming Linfield fans and the sectarianism and violence inherent in local football for the trouble, wondering why Linfield fans didn’t have tighter ticketing restrictions placed on them before the game (a totally fatuous and irrelevant argument, seeing as the violence took place over an hour later, miles away from the game) and calling for tighter controls on Linfield fans, despite them being the most restricted and controlled in the country.
When eyewitness accounts from 1) a man in the pub on the day in question, and 2) a passing taxi driver revealed that there were NO Linfield or for that matter red/white/blue colours on the persons of the gang involved, only people wearing typical casual/ hooligan gear, ie dark colours, faces covered, Stone Island clothing etc, Sinn Fein and Stephen Nolan backtracked, making themselves look ridiculous in the process.
1. Sinn Fein changed their story to allege that in fact the attackers were wearing Linfield SCARVES. Aha. So, notwithstanding the fact that you had originally alleged that Linfield shirts were on display, you’re now totally disregarding the widely-known fact that football firms don’t wear colours and saying that the eyesight of the (SF) witnesses were that good that they could see the words ‘Linfield FC’ on a red/white/blue scarf? Dead on.
2. Nolan changed tack, seemingly realising that Linfield fans and Linfield FC weren’t responsible for the trouble, and went on the attack with regards to a well-known Linfield FC song apparently glorifying violence, “Hatchets and Hammers”. Obviously, having been made to look silly in his original line of attack, he’d dug and shitstirred to find anything else possibly linked to Saturday’s events, and found that Linfield fans sang the following song:
My old man, said be a Linfield fan
And don’t dilly dally on the way
We took the Oval in half a minute
We took Coleraine and all that’s in it
With hatchets and hammers, Stanley knives and spanners
We’ll show the b*stards how to fight!
If you can’t beat a Glenman in half a minute
Then you’re not a Linfield fan.
Slightly violent admittedly, but then football fans are tribal and posturing, and this song has been doing the rounds for 40+ years, during the whole course of the Troubles, without anyone insulting mine and other people’s intelligence by suggesting that it incites football fans to violence. Ban Rocky! Ban Eastenders! Ban any TV violence, otherwise I’m going to go out and stab someone! Wise up.
Nolan then revealed that a similar version of the song is available on the ‘Windsor Roar’ music CD in the club shop, and that by implication, Linfield FC are partly responsible for the violence! What a crock. The Windsor Roar initiative was established to raise funds for the club and to help create a noisy, non-sectarian atmosphere inside Windsor Park. His allegations would be taken more seriously by myself and others if it weren’t for the fact that he is a Glentoran fan. He even said on the radio that he’d be at next Monday’s Setanta game at the Oval between Glentoran and Linfield. Hopefully he’ll be welcomed with big licks of ‘Hatchets and Hammers’, and have a few suitable songs and banners aimed at him. All in the interests of non-violence, of course. They're gunning for the Forum 'Hatchets and Hammers' too. Good luck with that boys.
Strange too that Nolan hasn't got onto Manchester United about their singing of this song and claiming of it as their own:
http://www.tshirtsunited.com/sale/tshirts/hatchetsandhammers.html