Supporters of the Spanish football club Seville will not be able to travel to Lens on Tuesday for a Champions League match, Interior Minister Gérald Darmanin announced on Sunday during an interview on the online media Brut.
“I am going to prohibit Seville supporters from coming to Lens,” declared the minister, questioned about the travel bans on supporters following the death of a Nantes fan during an altercation on December 2 with Nice supporters for in which a VTC driver was indicted and imprisoned.
These events “raise the particular question of football”, a sport where “the supporters, not all but a small part, are the most violent”, estimated Gérald Darmanin, noting that “we do not have that for other sports” . The Minister of Sports, Amélie Oudéa-Castéra, declared on Tuesday that she was in favor of “a moratorium on fan travel” by December 18.
She “took this position after consulting me with the president of the League (of professional football, Vincent Labrune, Editor’s note) to create an electric shock,” said Gérald Darmanin, less than eight months before the kick-off of the Olympic Games in Paris (July 26 – August 11).
On October 29, a match between OM and Olympique Lyonnais was canceled and postponed due to the stones of the coaches of OL players and their supporters, en route to the Vélodrome stadium, by Marseille supporters.
Former OL coach Fabio Grosso was injured in the face. Nazi salutes and monkey cries were then reported in the visitor parking area of the Vélodrome stadium. After the incidents of October 29, several investigations were opened by the Marseille prosecutor’s office.
