Here’s more on the ugly scenes that marred West Ham’s Europa Conference League semi-final victory at AZ Alkmaar.
Steph, a West Ham fan at the match in the Netherlands, called into White and Jordan this morning to explain what happened, as ultras attacked spectators in West Ham’s family and friends section of the stadium, with some of the Hammers players getting involved to try and protect them.
“We were in the 900 fans in the official away end, and we were caged in,” Steph told talkSPORT.
“We could not move, we were held back after the game, we watched it all kicking off in the corporate friends and family section.
“We wondered why the players didn’t come straight over to us after the game [in celebration] but now we obviously realise why.
“There was one guy, ‘Knollsy’, who was at the top of the stairs, he’s a West Ham fan in that section, he was holding back a sea of ultras, hooded yobs coming at them up the stairs.
“There was no security and no police in that stadium. It was a contrast to the Frankfurt game where we had riot police with shields and helmets in the stadium ready for trouble.
“The AZ stadium should have known there would be problems because we saw ultras in Alkmaar before the game, they were in pubs, we were told not to go to certain areas before the game and to go straight to the fan park, we known there was trouble before the game because the ultras were broken up by police.
“We knew and Alkmaar knew there was going to be trouble, but there was nothing in the ground whatsoever apart form these inane stewards who really did not have a clue how to behave under these circumstances. It was a big accident waiting to happen.
“In our end, in the cage section, we were clapping the normal AZ fans, the normal supporters like us, and they were clapping us – fair play, it was sportsmanlike.
“But we were held back about 30 minutes after the game because the ultras were waiting in their stand for us, and they got us buses back to the train station and back to Amsterdam.”