Minister demands initiative against fanaticism

NRW Interior Minister Herbert Reul calls on football clubs to invest in the safety of stadium visitors. In the Kölner Stadt-Anzeiger, the CDU politician spoke out in favour of “more and better trained stewards’ services”, “so that, for example, dangerous pyrotechnics do not get into the stadiums in the first place and stadium bans can also be consistently enforced”.

For “high-risk games”, Reul prefers personalised tickets to keep well-known problem fans away from the stadiums. Football should not “be destroyed by violent criminals disguised as fans. The clubs have to show a clear edge. And when it comes to safety, the clubs definitely still have room to manoeuvre.”

In its annual report for the 2017/18 season, the Central Observatory for Sport Operations (ZIS) recorded 1213 injured persons throughout Germany in connection with violence at football matches.