The French Sports Minister, Amélie Oudea-Casterahe pointed out this Monday to the Liverpool fans who, according to her, are the ones who caused the chaos at the entrance to the final match of the Champions League on Saturday, which forced its start to be delayed by 35 minutes.
“You have to keep in mind that there was a flow of British Liverpool fans without tickets or with fake tickets. The prefect estimated this accumulation at between 30,000 and 40,000 people, which represents an excess of personnel of more than 45%,” Oudéa-Castéra told the RTL radio station.
After the controversial action of the security forces, who tried to disperse the crowd that gathered around the Stade de Francelocated on the outskirts of Pariswith tear gas, the minister defended that the security forces received “exceptional” pressure.
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“They were the ones that had the most difficulties in controlling the flows. Then it was decided to build the first filtering zone, especially due to the proximity of the highway, which created risks for the population,” he continued.
According to Oudea-Casterawho until she entered the Government a week ago was general director of the French Tennis Federation, the decision of the police was finally to let people enter the esplanade, in a second area where there were turnstiles, but “since the entrances were false, the turnstiles were blocked.
“There was a concentration on the esplanade, which created security problems and congestion that created an extraordinarily frustrating wait for people,” he added.
This Monday, at 11:00 local time (09:00 GMT), the authorities involved in the organization of the party will meet in Paris to try to assess the problems that occurred on Saturday and ensure that they are not repeated in the future, especially with the fear of France to be marked two years after the organization of the Olympic Games. In 2023, France also hosts the Rugby World Cup.
Questioned about the numerous videos that showed young people without colors that identified them as followers of Liverpool or Real Madrid jumping the fences, the minister downplayed it, linking it to the concentration of spectators on the esplanade.
“When you have this concentration of people, there are attempts to force the doors of the Stadium in which, effectively, the youth of the neighborhood tried to sneak in. There were a number of difficulties,” he admitted.
According to her, the action of the Police sought to prevent the occurrence of a catastrophic invasion of the stadium that would disturb the match.
Also, regretted UEFA’s decision to accept delivery of paper tickets.
UEFA “accepted that there would be no exclusive use of the mobile application, which generates unclassifiable and non-transferable tickets. Liverpool requested that there be no use of this mobile application. UEFA accepted and created a circuit of paper tickets that created an overflow” , he pointed.
The minister praised the real Madridwho won the game by winning his fourteenth Champions League, prepared the arrival of his fans with buses from the airport and other organizational axes, and regretted that Liverpool did not control their fans in the same way.
