POLITICIANS and police yesterday vigorously condemned the "mindless and disgraceful" hooligans who rioted in towns and cities across Britain on Wednesday night after the defeat by Germany of the English football team in the Euro 96 semi final, writes Rachel Borrill.
In London, over 2,000 English fans congregated at Trafalgar Square to drown their sorrows but early yesterday, a hard core of several hundred hooligans attacked buses, smashed shop windows, overturned cars and threw bottles at the police.
Over 300 people were arrested and 66 were injured.
Although London experienced the worst violence, in Sussex a 17 year old Russian student was stabbed in a "vicious and unprovoked attack" by two English youths who thought he was German. The landlord of a Leeds pub died yesterday after he was beaten up as he tried to calm an argument between customers as they watched the game. Two men were being questioned last night about the death of a man who was found collapsed outside a pub in Beckenham, south London, at the time of the violence.
In Milton Keynes, 300 fans rampaged through the town centre. There was also trouble in Birmingham, Nottingham, Suffolk, Newport and Shropshire.
The British Prime Minister, Mr John Major, described the violence as "disgraceful" but argued that it should he taken in context.
"That demonstration was not remotely in the spirit of the whole tournament. It was not remotely in the spirit of the way the England football team played and it wasn't remotely in the sportsmaship that we actually saw on the pitch at Wembley," he said.
The Shadow Home Secretary, Mr Jack Straw, blamed the tabloid newspapers for provoking the hooligans by their declarations of war. "It is a great pity that the mindless behaviour of a small minority has tarnished the reputation of the thousands upon thousands of English football fans who have behaved so admirably throughout the Euro 96 tournament," he added.
Commander John Purnell, in charge of policing Euro 96, insisted the hooligans were not genuine football fans but were intent on causing trouble. He said the violence appeared to be aimed at the police and that officers recognised several of the hooligans.