Columbus, You Have a Problem

Referring to West Ham as “Brits” potentially kicked off the violence before matchday

I have deliberetly allowed two days to pass since the initial reports about the fracas at Crew Stadium have passed to comment on this site. I wanted to see what action was taken by the club and what the fallout was before rushing to judgement. After two days of evaluating the situation and talking to people across the country, I have come to the conclusion that the situation in Columbus must be dealt with sooner rather than later.

The simple one word association most Americans have with the sport of soccer is “hooligans.” The second word is “foreign.” So many bloggers and fans simply do not understand the negativity towards the sport we love that emanates from media blowing up incidents like the one the other night in Columbus. So many MLS/USL fans list incidents from NFL, NBA and NHL games and claim that makes these problems acceptable, but reality is that doesn’t matter. The bottom line is the media will treat and the public will perceive any incidents at an MLS match differently than anything at a mainstream American sporting event.

College Football has in the past proved to be a violent sport. Deaths have surrounded the Florida-Georgia game, the Texas A&M-Texas game and Michigan-Wisconsin game in recent years. But that sport is such a fabric of American life especially in the rural south and midwest it’s always chalked up to being drunk college fraternity kids who are living the American way. Nothing about College Football threatens the American fabric according to the demagogues who trash anything related to the beautiful game.

Significant elements of the American media wants this sport to fail and go away. Everytime something has happened at an MLS match this year no matter how minor it’s ended up on the “shout shows” like PTI, ATH and Rome is Burning as proof that Soccer is foreign and dangerous. Every time something happens at a College Football game it is simply “those poor kids” and “how terrible.”

Having spent several years working closely with a major international polling firm I can tell you most Americans don’t have the critical thinking skills that they used to on matters like this. It sounds condescending or elitist to make this blanket statement but I have seen empirical evidence that backs up such claims. The reason: Too many Americans depend on TV new, particularly cable news s to shape their perceptions. This trend started in the late 1980s but really intensified in the late 1990s. It’s a bi-partisan thing as the two most prominent prime political shows, the O’Reilly Factor and Countdown, both feature hosts who bash Soccer as foreign and un-American. One host is a right wing conservative and the other a left wing liberal. The liberal actually has a sports background where he used to bash Soccer.

This is what we are facing. I’ve heard time and time again that MLS and USL fans are actually better behaved than NFL, NBA or NHL fans. That may be true but is not the point. We don’t shape the perception, the media which is suspicious of this game does and we cannot give them fodder to bury this sport just as it is surging into the American conscience.

Where does the Columbus Crew fit in this? We’ve had a budding Hooligan problem in this league and in USL for a few years now. When I spoke with Dougie Brimson about the Toronto FC situation two months ago he told me that he had predicted this to the MLS brass a year ago and that they were serious about combating the threat. It seems whatever memo went out from the league office was read in thirteen cities and in some cases over done (like in New Jersey this past weekend) but in Columbus a team that once led the MLS in attendance but now struggles to get respectable crowds has seemingly turned a blind eye to incident after incident.

Here is what has happened around the US & Canada this year:

1) Portland has rowdy fans that sing throughout the matches but hardly ever pick fights with the other teams supporters. They sing, they chant and the Timbers supporters demonstrate to us how passionate football support should be. I do not know of one incident that has made the news recently about the Timbers supporters stepping over the line so to speak.

2) In Houston, after the El Battalion started a fight with Chivas USA supporters, club itself and the other large supporters group the Texian Army took strong action against EB and little trouble has occurred since. The Superliga matches involving Mexican sides at Robertson will basically trouble free.

3) Chivas USA banned several members of a supporters group that picked a fight with the LA Riot squad outside the SuperClassico match in April from several matches and the entire Supporters groups choose to sit out the matches in solidarity with their members.

4) TFC dealt with the problems of violence on the GO trains after matches as well as frequent pitch invaders and no trouble has occurred since. The Metropolitan police in Toronto have increased their presence around the ground on matchdays.

Now let’s look at Columbus and contrast it with the above situations:

1- Columbus did not adequately police the tailgate area before the season opener with Toronto and thus many TFC fans were attacked and with a lack of port o lets for such a large tailgate area, inevitably tensions flared and not only did fans urinate on the ground but they began fighting with one another.

2- At the same match the police presence was so minimal several TFC fans were able to storm the pitch and head towards the goal Columbus was defending.

3- When I discussed the Toronto situation openly and honestly and tried to engage TFC fans on my CSRN show the complaints about me being “too soft on TFC” all seemed to come from Crew fans. Days later several Crew fans were shouting racial obscenities at New England players as caught on You Tube. The Columbus fans also were caught throwing glass bottles and coins on the pitch during the 2nd half of the match.

4- The organization and supporters group in complete contrast to the strong a decisive actions of Chivas USA and Houston in fighting hooliganism tried to cover up the situation and wouldn’t give up the individuals involved. The team would not take action so the league had to after several embarrassing columns were written in newspapers, some of which hardly cover the sport normally. Even more alarming was the attempt by some Columbus supporters to go after sponsors of the MLS Rumors site who had exposed the behavior at Crew Stadium. This is the way off a hooligan, to threaten and bully.

5- In defiance of a league wide ban Columbus fans began sprayed confetti and streamers on opposing players while attempting a corner. Now I cannot recall the specific match but it was done. Why the security did not confiscate the items at the gate is beyond anyone’s comprehension. The league wide ban was more or less enforced throughout the rest of the league. When pressed on the situation at Crew Stadium, Columbus GM, Mark McCullers blamed Toronto FC for the trouble league wide and avoided totally the issue of racist fans.

6- Sunday’s incident: West Ham has a reputation for having rowdy fans, but we’ve hosted English clubs before and never had trouble. The poster promoting the match was an implicit call for some sort of nationalistic pride from the fans, which often times in the past has evolved into violence when West Ham is involved. I’m as nationalistic as it comes when this game is involved whether it be the US National Team, Superliga, or even the Carribean club cup which USL side Puerto Rico participates in. But saying “we take on the Brits, you push us over the top,” is in fact way over the top to steal a line from Crew promotion department. How would Tigres supporters have taken a posted in Dnever prior to the Tecate Cup match two weeks ago that read ” Colorado fans put us over the top against the Mexicans?” The poster and its message strongly indicate to me the Crew management has no interest in stopping the continued incidents at Crew Stadium.

In addition, at some point soon either the local law enforcement needs to be better trained to handle situations like this or the Columbus fans have to be mature enough to walk away. I have to state that I firmly believe that if West Ham had played, let’s say Real Salt Lake instead of Columbus these problems would have been avoided.

Here is my thesis on the situation: Columbus attendance once the highest in MLS has now become among the worst in the league. I believe the organization, desperate to create an atmosphere and attract new fans is purposely turning a blind eye to the things other organizations are stamping out immediately. As I have said to this point we’ve had no repeat incidents in Houston, Toronto or LA because those matters were dealt with by the club before the next home match. Columbus on the other hand has allowed things to fester. They are going to have to take action this time for the good of MLS and Soccer in this country.

It’s really a shame. At one time the Crew were the model for MLS. They built their own ground while the rest of the league was still using NFL/College Football stadiums and had such a good record of finding players and developing talent. But this year’s version of the Crew while talented on the pitch has left a sour taste in many people’s mouths because this stuff just keep happening and happening. The Crew organization also deserves better in terms of results. As I’ve said they’ve been long one of MLS’ model teams but have consistently fallen just short of winning anything significant.

Please, Columbus clean up your own mess and stop blaming others for your problems. You have a problem and it needs to be stamped out not just for the good of your organization, but for the good of the league and the good of the game. In addition, Soccer fans throughout this country need to support whatever moves MLS and Crew make to clean up this mess.

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The Wembley Experience: Lesson About Hooliginism

My experience at Wembley Stadium the other night for the US-England game was outstanding. Not only because of the atmosphere and enthusiasm around international football at England’s National Stadium and throughout London (Although I will point out that this visit reinforced a long held belief of mine having visited both cities on multiple occasions that Londoners are much ruder and more condescending than Parisians, but that people from England outside of London are simply more personable) but because of what I discovered about English football. As has been mentioned in a previous post many of the English fans I spoke to were from outside London and supported lower league sides. Many said that they find the Premier League dull and predictable while being curious about MLS, especially the play of the British players who used to play football in England. (I was asked specific questions about Rohan Ricketts, Terry Cooke and Ronnie O’Brien) This stands in direct contrast to the legions of American fans who flock to the Premier League and spend time ridiculing their own domestic league.

As has been discussed on both the American Soccer Show and on this blog the past few weeks MLS has a developing problem with controlling fan behavior. In my conversations with English fans I attempted to get a sense of how supporters of the clubs in the Coca Cola Championship, League One and League Two deal with the problems. The answers I got were fascinating. As Dougie Brimson pointed out in our interview with him a few weeks back, self policing is the key. If any fan attempts to create a violent atmosphere or a “showdown” with supporters of other clubs they are simply ostracized or thrown out of the supporters groups. In addition, supporters work with local police and with opposing clubs and their supporters groups to head off any problems before they become issues. Acknowledgment is a key to dealing with problems as I have been repeatedly told.

This was demonstrated to me as on a few separate occasions English fans did try and start unsolicited taunting of me or other US supporters only to be called off by another England supporter or to stop when they saw groups of four or five police officers nearby both before and after the match. The police presence was impressive but to me even more impressive was the maturity of some English fans to tell their fellow supporters to chill out when they saw me sporing a US jacket and scarf. That’s not to say I wasn’t taunted often or that some fans were trying to provoke a reaction out of me. For example, when I walked on the train at Queens Park Station to go to Paddington to switch to the Heathrow Express, four English fans greeted me with chants of “you are gay, you are gay” chanted like U-S-A, U-S-A. I did not react but did see others on the train sort of stare down the four young, drunk looking fans and I simply ignored them.

But as I said acknowledgment is part of solving the problem. This past week we had arguably the worst incident of fan behavior in the thirteen year history of MLS. As our friends at the MLS Rumors site have discussed in the conversation they have been leading for several weeks now, it is important to recognize and confront these incidents as they occur. When we discussed Toronto FC a few weeks back we saw somewhat militant but intelligent responses. It was obvious from some of the responses and my subsequent conversations that many TFC supporters take the situation seriously and are attempting to deal with it. However, anything that has gone on in Toronto pales in comparison with the events in Columbus this past weekend.

What’s even more disturbing about the situation in Columbus is that little accountability has been demonstrated by supporters of the Crew. When we discussed TFC a few weeks back, ironically enough a few comments were left by Columbus fans claiming that the behavior of TFC supporters who came to Ohio for the MLS opener had created the environment where many Crew fans were unwilling to go to the subsequent matches. Now we have learned if anything it is the behavior of the Crew’s own supporters and the lack of willingness of their supporters groups to police their own that have gotten us to this position.

So defensive about the situation are some Crew supporters that they have even threatened to go after the sponsors of the MLS Rumors site which broke the story. I ask those particular Crew supporters, Why stop there? Why not go after the Boston Globe, the Washington Post, WBNS TV, You Tube and the MLS itself, among others for acknowledging and confronting the situation in Columbus. If you are so convinced your fans are being thrown under the bus why not boycott any media outlet that doesn’t rubber stamp your agenda of sweeping these issues under the rug. From my vantage point the response of some in Columbus is simply nothing less than cowardly and insulting.

The incidents of racism were so ugly in Columbus on Saturday night that they do not bear repeating. They have cast MLS in a negative light in the mainstream media, the type of situation we had hoped to avoid and why specifically I wrote the piece I did several weeks back. The irony once again is that it was a few Crew supporters that claimed I was not tough enough on Toronto FC. But it is Columbus who now must do something about this situation before others are forced to take action against them.

One thing I have learned from speaking with Dougie Brimson and my experiences at Wembley is that while these sorts of incidents are common place still England, they are dealt with quickly and firmly be it by law enforcement or by supporters groups. If we don’t develop the same culture of self policing and honesty about these incidents here in the US we are doomed to a consistent repeat of the sort of ugly incidents that have engulfed so many football leagues throughout the globe in the not so distant past.

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Glidden to Sponsor Crew

The Crew have announced a partnership with Glidden, and this is noteworthy because this is perhaps the first jersey sponsor that can be considered a major corporation. See the above image for the Crew's new look

Crew on a Roll

Columbus is officially red hot. The Crew on their third straight match Saturday night and are now undefeated in the last four. As we discussed on the Major League Soccer Talk podcast a few weeks back, the remarkable comeback at Gillette Stadium to draw east leading New England 3-3 seemed to have changed the entire psychology of the Columbus team. Sigi Schmidt, who is renowned for working with young players has brought in veteran Argentine maestro Guilermo Baros Schelleto to help groom the younger players and it seems to be working.

After being left for dead as one of MLS' worst clubs by most critics just three weeks ago, the Crew are now only four points out of first place in the ultra competitive Eastern Conference. What happens next in the East is anyone's guess. I tend to believe with Fred finally integrated in the attack, when Jaime Moreno and Ben Olsen return from Copa America, DC United will once again be the league's best team. But too many other formidable sides including Columbus, and of course Red Bull NY, Kansas City and New England play in the East to assume anything. Toronto FC's scoring punch especially at home makes them a potential sleeper, and Chicago is struggling but now has two foreign slots open so they can be aggressive in the transfer market. (This week Chicago waived Pascal Bedrosian, and Honduran Midfielder Ivan Guerrero received his green card meaning he no longer counts as an international player under league rules.)

In the Western Conference, FC Dallas and Houston appear to be the two best teams, while Chivas USA is difficult to beat at home even though they seem to be getting smaller and smaller crowds for each home match. Colorado has faded while the LA Galaxy and Real Salt Lake are clearly the worst teams in the league right now.

Report: Guillermo Barros Schelotto Signs with Crew

SI.com is reporting some potentially huge news for MLS. Guillermo Barros Schelotto whose popularity has reached cult status among Boca Juniors fans will sign with the Columbus Crew instead of joining one of several European clubs who had expressed interest. Schelotto has been one of the best players ever in Argentine Football although his success on the club level has not been replicated as an international for his country.

If MLS returned to Miami, the signing of Schelotto would bring a boatload of Boca Juniors fans through the gates. Instead the Argentine legend will toil in small market Columbus, but no doubt exists a player of his pedigree and quality will improve the product on the field even if he makes little impact filling the stands.