police’s view of the whole 4,000,” he
says. “Not here, but in other places
you’ll then see the decent fans get the
rough end of it as a result of the
behaviour of the idiots. We were getting
comments from England fans passing
us; they don’t like it, they’re not happy
with it, they are a bit embarrassed by it.
“More and more, we need to try to
give a voice to the decent fans and mar-
ginalise the idiots. Because it is boorish,
sad behaviour, but the problem is the
perception it brings.
“We have to work with other police
forces and try to explain that it’s not all
England fans. We now need to work
hard with the Qataris [before the World
Cup in November and December] and
other police forces to try to explain that
it’s not all of our fans — it’s an element.”
Roberts agrees that it is a younger
element. “We are seeing younger
groups going out intent on causing
violence,” he says. “I think we’ve got to
keep emphasising the influence of
alcohol. You could see the behaviour
deteriorating over the course of the
evening. We see that in the UK as well.
“We know drugs are an increasing
problem. But the nexus between bad
behaviour and alcohol is absolutely
clear. That’s why I’m really against any
suggestion that adding more alcohol is
a good idea.” Roberts is referring to the
proposal in the recent review into foot-
ball governance, led by Tracey Crouch
MP, that suggested that lower league
clubs be allowed to serve alcohol during
matches to boost revenue.
Efforts are being made to tackle these
problems. Drug abuse will now be in-
cluded in new football banning order
legislation, while this week the Premier
League clubs agreed to send teams of
stewards to away matches in an effort to
prevent pitch invasions.
As Roberts says, it requires a collec-
tive approach, one that includes theManchester United have opened talks
with Barcelona over a move for the
£65 million-rated Holland midfielder
Frenkie de Jong.
Strengthening in midfield is Erik ten
Hag’s transfer priority this summer and
the club’s transfer negotiators are work-
ing on a deal to bring the 25-year-old,
who played under the new United
manager at Ajax, to Old Trafford.
Initial contact has been made
between the parties and it is under-
the times | Saturday June 11 2022 1GS 13
YouTube’s cricket streams
under attack from hijackers
YouTube is under pressure to
prevent the streaming of county
cricket matches being hijacked by
bogus claims of copyright
infringement.
There have been numerous
incidents of coverage being
interrupted after reports to
YouTube claiming to be from the
ECB or companies that hold the
broadcast rights. The counties say
YouTube then blocks their
streams without checking whether
the complaints are legitimate.
Matches affected include Kent
v Essex in the Vitality Blast on
Tuesday and Lancashire v
Derbyshire in the same
competition last week. Many
other matches have also been
affected this season and last,
including West Indies v Ireland.
Sources at Lancashire say
40,000 people were watching the
stream last week when it wasinterrupted with 90 minutes
remaining. Coverage was never
restored. They believe that India-
based operators of another
YouTube stream, which was re-
streaming their coverage illicitly,
made the bogus complaint,
meaning they could draw in more
viewers and then charge them.
Viewers of Essex v Kent got a
message saying: “This video is no
longer available due to a
copyright claim by England and
wales cricket board [sic] / Sport
Technologies Pvt Ltd”.
The ECB confirmed that it had
not made any such request while
Sport Technologies Pvt, an Indian
company that streams sports
events, was not available to
comment. A spokeswoman said:
“They are improper YouTube
takedown requests.’’
YouTube said it was aware of the
incidents and was investigating.King sees initials
Billie Jean King paid a visit to
Wimbledon this week to be filmed
for a BBC documentary — and
also visited the grand-slam
tournament’s new honours
boards, which for married women
no longer show the initials and
surnames of their husbands.
King’s six Wimbledon titles
used to read “Mrs L W King” —
reflecting her husband Larry
King’s initials — but now read
“B J King”. The use of Miss and
Mrs has also been dropped.
John Lloyd will no longer be
able to look up at the board and
see “Mrs J M Lloyd” for the 1981
title won by his wife at the time,
Chris Evert.
“I have taken a few guests to
Wimbledon and shown them that,
saying, ‘Look, basically, I’ve won
a singles title’,” he told The Daily
Telegraph this week.Are you sure you didn’t know, Greg?
The respected
American golf writer
Alan Shipnuck
found himself
blocked from
attending Phil
Mickelson’s press
conference at the
Saudi-backed
breakaway LIV
tournament this week
and sent a text to GregNorman — the LIV
chief executive — to
complain.
“Did not hear,
thanks for letting
me know,” Norman
replied... only for
Shipnuck to then
send a picture of
Norman, far left,
present while the security
“goons” blocked his path.Liverpool’s déjà vu
It is hardly surprising that
Liverpool fans reacted with
cynicism to the announcement by
Paris’s police chief that CCTV
footage from the Champions
League final at the Stade de
France — where fans were tear-
gassed — had been deleted
accidentally. The 2014
Hillsborough inquest heard that
two video tapes containing CCTV
footage of events at the 1989
disaster had been stolen from a
locked cupboard in the control
room after the tragedy.Split from oligarch
The former head of special
projects at Chelsea who became
Roman Abramovich’s UK-based
spokeswoman Rola Brentlin has
parted company with the oligarch.
Brentlin is no longer working
for Chelsea either after the sale of
the club to a consortium headed
by Todd Boehly.Charity on shirts
Plymouth Argyle have provided a
refreshing change to those
football clubs who sign up betting
companies or cryptocurrency
firms as shirt sponsors. Next
season the club’s men’s, women’s
and junior teams will promote a
local charity that works to
alleviate poverty.
Project 35 will appear on the
front of the shirts “to raise
awareness of the harsh reality
that many local families are
facing amid a cost-of-living crisis”,
the club said.
The food firm Ginsters is
paying for the shirt sponsorship
but giving it over to the charity.SPORT
NOTEBOOK
Martyn Ziegler
Chief Sports Reporter
SPORTS JOURNALIST OF THE YEARUnited in talks over De Jong transfer
stood that, despite previous comments
indicating that he was happy in Spain,
De Jong is open to making a move.
The midfielder joined Barcelona in
2019 for £65 million and has gone on to
make 139 appearances. But with the
Catalan club in financial difficulty they
need to sell some of their assets this
summer. It is understood Barcelona
would accept a bid in the region of what
they paid Ajax for him three years ago.
De Jong is open to working with Ten
Hag again after he played a key role in
helping Ajax to reach the Champions
League semi-finals in 2019.De Jong is one of several stars that
United are pursuing. The club con-
firmed yesterday that 11 players would
be leaving Old Trafford at the expira-
tion of their contracts at the end of this
month. The exits of Nemanja Matic,
Paul Pogba and Juan Mata have inten-
sified the need for a new midfielder.
Edinson Cavani and Jesse Lingard
are also leaving, which creates space for
an attacking addition to the squad.
United have an interest in the Benfica
forward Darwin Núñez, but sources say
they will not be dragged into a bidding
war with Liverpool for the 22-year-old.Charlotte Duncker
troublemakers
As the night progresses, and the fans get progressively drunker, the patience of
the German police officers is severely tested by a minority intent on causing
trouble; in the end there are only 13 arrests, three of which are for Nazi salutesfans too. This week, an England sup-
porter was detained at Heathrow for
the possession of a knife. Yet a senior
figure from the Football Supporters’
Association complained on Twitter
that the police were using legislation
from the Terrorism Act to stop and
question fans at airports when, in fact,
Section 21 of the Football Spectators
Act provides those powers. The FSA
official has since corrected the tweet.
“It needs a bit of a shared effort here,”
Roberts says. “Banning orders are one
element. But I think you’ll have seen
the efforts the English police officers
have made to engage with them, give
them a warning, try to calm it down.
“Equally they’ve got to know that
we’ve got good legislation. There will be
people receiving bans as a result of this
operation. It’s an effective tool. We have
close to 1,300 on banning orders. If
some of them had been here, things
could have been worse.”k
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