73 killed as riot erupts at soccer match

Seventy-three people were killed and at least 1,000 injured on Wednesday after a soccer pitch invasion in the Egyptian city of Port Said, in what a minister called the biggest disaster in the nation’s soccer history.

It was the deadliest incident of football violence since Oct 16 1996, when 78 died and 180 were injured in a stampede in Guatemala City before a World Cup qualifier between Guatemala and Costa Rica.

Angry politicians and sports officials decried a lack of security at the match between Port Said team al-Masry and Al Ahli, blaming the nation’s leaders for allowing — or even causing — the tragedy.