Enda Stevens: Football players ‘fearing for their lives’ after spate of pitch invasions

Enda Stevens during a Republic of Ireland press conference at FAI National Training Centre in Abbotstown, Dublin. Photo by Stephen McCarthy/Sportsfile

Republic of Ireland international Enda Stevens says football players are ‘fearing for their lives’ after a spate of recent pitch invasions in England which have seen players and managers targeted by rival fans.

The Sheffield United player witnessed his own teammate Billy Sharp being head-butted by a Nottingham Forest fan after their Championship playoff semi-final at the City Ground with the forward ultimately needing four stitches for the wound caused.

Robert Biggs has since been sentenced to 24 weeks in prison and ordered to pay Sharp compensation of £500 but Stevens, who was injured but present for that game, has also criticised the role played by the police on the day in question.

“Shocking,” he said of the incident. “Over the course of that week or so, it was happening continuously. I was out there with him and it was just an absolute disgrace. The thing is with that, you're actually fearing for your life. You're on a pitch and thinking, 'I can be attacked at any moment here'.

“There was no help for us, nobody there to protect us. There were policemen beside us who didn't help us and didn't want to get involved, that seen it happen first-hand and done nothing, and then a few of our lads ended up trying to protect Billy when the second fella came up into his face.

“Now it seems the police are coming after them and questioning them for what they have done, but all we could do was protect ourselves and help each other out. It's something in football that needs to change.

“I don't really blame the stewards because it's very hard for them to contain 25,000 or 30,000 Nottingham Forest fans, but the situation was shocking and it shouldn't be happening.” Stevens recalled a similar situation from his time with Portsmouth in the middle part of the last decade, when they played south-coast rivals Plymouth Argyle, but that was nothing like as serious as the incident that unfolded a few weeks ago.

Ireland manager Stephen Kenny is being kept to speed on the situation in Armenia, where they travel this week, and where there have been organised mass protests and scores of arrests as a result of political tensions for over a month now.

The Boys in Green have played in plenty of strange and hostile environments down the years but the events in England have been deeply unsettling with incidents experienced at both ends of the professional game’s pyramid of late.

Crystal Palace manager Patrick Vieira was involved in an altercation with an Everton fan at Goodison Park while Aston Ville goalkeeper Robin Olsen was reportedly attacked by a Manchester City fan at the Etihad Stadium on the final day of the Premier League.

There were similar troubles in League Two with Mansfield forward Jordan Bowery targeted after their play-off defeat to Northampton while punches were said to be thrown at Swindon players after they lost a separate League Two play-off to Port Vale.

“It comes down to protecting us,” said Stevens. “We are the one's isolated out there and we had no protection at all. There were people in place to protect us but they chose not to, you know? They could see it first-hand and they didn't help us.

“It was up to ourselves to help each other out and try get ourselves off the pitch, whereas they could probably do better in terms of policing it more, more stewards. It is a difficult one for the stewards, I do understand that, but it is something that has to change."

What that might be no-one quite seems to know.

No-one wants a return to the dark days of fences around the pitch perimeter when supporters were ‘caged in’ and kept apart from each other and the people they had paid in to see perform. The other imponderable is where this has all sprung from.

That recent incidents occurred at crucial, highly-pressurised occasions is an obvious theme and it may be that these collective pitch invasions and individual acts of violence are pent-up releases after the frustrations built up through the pandemic.

“Obviously they have been away from the game for two years with coronavirus,” Stevens said. “Emotions were high, it was an emotional game and it's all well (and good) if you want to run onto the pitch and celebrate but the attacking of opposition players is an absolute disgrace.

“Especially that there is 11 lads, or a squad of 20 lads, and there is 20,000 people on a pitch running at you from left, right and centre. You don't know what is going to happen. It could come from anywhere.

“The fact of what happened to Billy, it was clear as day, and Billy wasn't too far away from the tunnel and that's where you should be policed the most, like, in that tunnel. With the stewards, they should be all around there protecting people from getting in. We were right beside the tunnel and again we had zero protection.”