32 injured, including one serious: A heavy toll of violent clashes between fans Thursday at the Allianz Rivera in Nice before the meeting of the European League Conference between OGC Nice and Germany FC Cologne, which was finally postponed by an hour and ended in a 1-1 draw.
“It was the Germans who were accused,” according to the prefecture, questioned by AFP. AFP journalists at the stadium found that fans were sometimes hit by armed men with chairs or iron bars torn into the stadium.
A total of 32 people, including two police officers and a flight attendant, were injured, and four were taken to hospital, according to the province’s latest report at around 4:30 p.m. (Quebec time).
Among them, a fan from the FC Cologne wing was taken to hospital in an “absolute emergency” after falling more than 5 meters between two levels of the stands. His vital diagnosis is no longer involved, according to the county’s last point.
“Very alcoholic,” this guy was actually a Paris fan, set at 8:00 PM. Colors. Some spectators could have spotted in Nice before the meeting.
At the start of the match, at 7:40 pm, about an hour late, the Paris Saint-Germain fan club “Supras Auteuil” raised a banner in the stand dedicated to the Germans, an AFP journalist noted.
The governorate explained that in the face of these incidents, the stadium doors were “temporarily closed until calm returns” after the police intervened.
France Press agency
During a crisis meeting in the stadium between representatives of UEFA (editor’s note: UEFA), the governor of Alpes Maritim, the public prosecutor and the mayor of Nice, Christian Estrosi, jointly decided to postpone the kick – suspended, originally scheduled for 6: 45 pm.
After a German-language ad asking Cologne fans to calm down, Nice’s Brazilian captain Dante took the microphone to speak to Nice supporters: “We all know it has nothing to do with you,” Dante fired. “I am counting on you and the organization to be able to play this game. I am counting on you and your support.”
The Minister of Sports, Amelie Odea Castera, lamented that “our sport is dirty”, Thursday evening, during an event organized by the Sportura Association with sponsors in Paris.
“We are fed up, we are really fed up that our sport is polluted in this way, we can no longer tell ourselves that we go with our children in a calm and reassuring way on the playground,” the minister lamented.
France Press agency
Even on Thursday afternoon, even before reaching the stadium, German fans destroyed the monuments of Nice and put signs on the tram stops in Nice. The Nice City Council has assessed the damages and Mr Estrosi has indicated that he will ask the Cologne Club for compensation.
“There were indications of a confrontation from the German fans outside the stadium,” Chief of Staff Benoit Huber told AFP.
At 8:30 p.m., at the end of the first half of the match, no one had been arrested, according to the county.
A year ago, in August 2021, the Mediterranean derby between Nice and Marseille fell into Ligue 1 and the match never ended.
Cute fans invaded the stadium and turned it into a ring after OM playmaker Dimitri Payet sent another plastic bottle directed at him towards the runway.
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