An eye-witness account of England v Russia in Marseille
Monday 13 June 2016 14:38, UK
A look at the England v Russia matchday experience in Marseille through the eyes of Sky Sports News HQ's James Kilpatrick.
Reading the numerous reports of the fan violence that unfolded in Marseille on Saturday shocked me after having a match day experience that, for the most part, I felt safe.
I set off to the game with my brother late Saturday morning on a direct train from Beziers, a small town on the south coast, to Marseille. The two-and-a-half hour direct train terminated at Gare de Marseille-Saint-Charles, the city's main train station, at around 2pm.
As soon as I got off the train, I could see a sea of England shirts alongside a smaller portion of Russia fans in their national colours. Again, from what I saw, there was no trouble at that point despite the large number of supporters mixing in a confined space.
Our plan was to go from the main station on the metro to check into our accommodation in the eastern part of the city before heading down south to the fan park.
A lot of England supporters, instead of taking the metro, looked to be queuing for taxis and were possibly heading towards the Old Port which would have been just a 10-minute journey. The short metro journey, again, seemed to draw zero problems.
At the main station, there looked to be plenty of UEFA promotional signs saying to check out the fan park, but no real indication of where it actually was.
This lack of information may have been why so many people headed to the Old Port instead, where seemingly most England fans were located and where the centre of the fan violence was.
We got off at Rond-Point du Prado, the metro station right next to the Stade Velodrome. It was also the closest station to the fan park located on Prado beach, which was a 30-minute walk from there. After checking in to our accommodation, we headed down to the beach at around 3:30pm.
The walk down Avenue du Prado felt almost serene as small groups of England supporters made their way down to the fan zone.
Once there, it was a relief to see the heavy amount of security at the fan zone present. However, what I found strange was the relatively small amount of England fans.
England and Russia fans had been separated into different fan zones with their own big screens, and each person was searched before they could enter.
We stayed in the fan park for around four hours, taking in the sun and the extortionately priced food and drink - maybe another reason why many supporters headed to the Old Port instead - while watching the end of Albania v Switzerland and the entirety of Wales v Slovakia with hundreds of other England fans.
What was surprising was not only how relaxed the entire place was, but also it looked only half full from around 5.00pm until we left for the stadium at 7.30pm.
After the walk back up the Avenue du Prado with a mob of excited England fans, there was a chaotic meeting point at the roundabout very close to Stade Velodrome.
England fans, from the fan park, were walking up from the south while those from the west were coming from the direction of the Old Port.
The stadium was to the east and, once we reached the roundabout, tear gas could be seen drifting from the left and a lot of loud noise. Some kind of scuffle seemed to have broken out - only a few hundred yards away from the stadium.
With personal safety the priority, everyone around me attempted to head for the ground, but were surprisingly being blocked off by riot police.
For no explainable reason, riot police looked to be attempting to divert fans, myself included, towards the tear gas, and the trouble, rather than the stadium.
Luckily, there were gap between two of the men which some were able to break through before heading to the ground.
Once outside the immense 67,000 seat stadium, tension was in the air. Each person was individually searched, and tickets were scanned, before being granted access to the ground. Loud chants from both sides caused plenty of anxious looks.
Without any real way of knowing beforehand (or perhaps my own naivety), our seats happened to be located in the Russian end.
Walking through the gate, the England fans were still jovial as Jamie Vardy chants and 'don't take me home' were sung repeatedly and created what felt like a rousing atmosphere.
As the game progressed, from where I was sitting, there were no signs of any problems even with the occasional Russia fan sitting among England fans. It was not until Vasili Berezutski's late equaliser when matters seemed to get heated.
Play was temporarily stopped as a flare was hurled onto the pitch from someone in the Russia section, quickly followed by a loud bang.
Just afterwards, a notice came up on the two big screens asking Russian fans to remain seated after the game, how effective that was I'm not so sure.
Although I had a limited view of what was happening in the Russia section, what was shocking to me was seemingly nobody looked to have approached the men letting off the flares and fireworks.
There was a very thin line of security separating the fans, which looked to have completely dispersed once the final whistle blew.
Just moments before referee Nicola Rizzoli blew the final whistle, there were sudden signs of movement from fans heading towards where we were sitting, which was only around 10 seats from one of the gate exits.
When the final whistle blew, to the right we could see a whole wave of England fans sprinting towards the exits and climbing down from the railings to escape an increasingly violent atmosphere.
Our seat position meant we were able to get out quickly and saw very few Russian fans outside the ground.
For us, that was the end of any potential danger but may have been a completely different story for some who made their way towards the metro station or the city centre.
