Football
PA Sport 7y

West Ham's Slaven Bilic 'didn't expect' to find hooliganism in England

Slaven Bilic has backed West Ham's zero tolerance policy on the hooligans who shamed the club against Chelsea on Wednesday night.

The Hammers intend to ban 200 fans who were involved in the crowd trouble that marred their 2-1 EFL Cup win at the London Stadium.

Coins, seats and plastic bottles were thrown between home and away supporters and stewards and police had to intervene to prevent rival fans clashing.

Hammers boss Bilic, like many, felt such shocking scenes were a thing of the past -- in England at least -- and admits it needs stamping out.

The Croatian said: "Don't get me wrong but I've been in those environments before, unfortunately. Whether that's in Turkey, or even at home, a few times even in Russia.

"But I didn't expect it here to be fair. England was so far clear of it.

"It should be stopped from the beginning. You don't want to say, 'Yeah they have the same problems abroad, it's worldwide,' and then it grows up.

"On the other hand, it's much less here than anywhere. We have those few countries who don't have it like England [and] Germany.

"You are one of the few, an oasis, that is still very good and it's great when the media is a little bit overreacting, because it should be zero tolerance, there's no such thing as overreacting."

The violence completely overshadowed West Ham's impressive win, secured thanks to fine goals from Cheikhou Kouyate and Edimilson Fernandes.

Instead the abiding image was of a man from the Chelsea end wading across the tarpaulin separating the two sets of supporters to confront West Ham fans.

Bilic added: "Sky television is there 24-7 in the canteen and every time I looked it was that guy from Chelsea, all the time!

"I was expecting Cheikhou Kouyate's header to be there. I'm on antibiotics so I didn't go out go on the pitch, I was inside. And it was always him!"

^ Back to Top ^