Players Warned By Police Over Manchester Derby Conduct

Chris Wright

16th, April 2010

7 Comments

By Chris Wright

The players of Manchester City and Manchester United have been warned by the police over their conduct in the upcoming Manchester derby game on Saturday.

Greater Manchester Police contacted both clubs earlier this week to warn them that there can be no repeat of the provocative behaviour that has marred the previous meetings between the clubs this season.

The force admitted that January’s two Carling Cup games featured levels of crowd disturbance that hadn’t been witnessed for a number of years, and that the ugly scenes inside and outside of the stadium had been directly precipitated by the behaviour of players on the pitch.

But the police are hoping to engineer an altogether friendlier atmosphere during this weekend’s clash by asking the players to tone down their ‘passion’.

Assistant chief constable Ian Hopkins said:

“Our main aim is to ensure it is an enjoyable experience for all fans. This is a high-profile fixture and we have been working closely with Manchester City Football Club to ensure the day passes off peacefully.”

Good luck schmuck.

If memory serves, every single meeting between City and United this season has featured at least one moment of ‘provocative’ behaviour.

The first league meeting saw Craig Bellamy slap a fan who invaded the pitch and Gary Neville warned by the FA over the way he celebrated United’s winner in front of the City fans.

The first leg of the Carling Cup game is now infamous as the match Carlos Tevez chose to bestow Neville with a wonderful new nickname (‘bootlicker’) after the pair exchanged gestures (see picture above), and in the second leg Bellamy – the same names seem to be cropping up here – was hit by a bottle that was thrown from the crowd.

It’s not shaping up like the kind of game that will pass without incident now is it Mr Hopkins? Should be a cracker though.

Posted in Man City, Man Utd

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7 Comments

  1. TSPOT says:

    Fans will kick off whether the players celebrate provacatively or not.

    There are always going to be idiots at the derby games spoiling for a fight and in the carling cup first leg the police let the man utd fans out at the same time as the city fans whereas normally in a high
    risk match they are held back for 20 mins or so.

    Just hold the man u fans back after the match and eject and idiots drunken or otherwise problem solved.

    Man city 3 – 1 Man Utd 1 ………..

  2. TSPOT says:

    any idiots not and idiots my mistake.

  3. Mathers says:

    i say the winner should be decided on a tag team wrestling match. Bellamy and Tevez v.s Neville and Rooney

  4. TSPOT says:

    lol that would be brilliant although im sure rooney would win with a big daddy belly flop on top of a tev bellamy pile up

  5. hollis says:

    @Mathers

    Neville would last about 5 seconds before Bellamy bit his head off.

  6. […] City v Manchester United at Eastlands – Both clubs have already been warned by police to play nice and not restart the hand gesture war they had last time. Meanwhile, Man City are upset […]

  7. kritter says:

    Tevez is the type that probably keeps a knife in his sock just in case.

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