It’s UEFA’s doing, really. European football’s governing body abdicated its responsibility to make a decision about the participation of Israeli teams in European competitions and now we’re here.
UEFA passed the buck to individual cities around a continent Israel isn’t even in. Some sort of ugly shambles is inevitable is all four of the cities that will be visited by Maccabi Tel Aviv and we learned on Thursday exactly what kind of mess will be bestowed upon Aston Villa and the city of Birmingham.
It was announced on Thursday that Birmingham’s Safety Advisory Group (SAG), which is responsible for issuing safety certificates for major events like football matches in the city, had informed Villa that no away supporters will be permitted at their Europa League match against Maccabi Tel Aviv in November.
The language of Villa’s club statement is important.
“Following a meeting this afternoon, the SAG have formally written to the club and UEFA to advise no away fans will be permitted to attend Villa Park for this fixture,” reads the statement.
“West Midlands Police have advised the SAG that they have public safety concerns outside the stadium bowl and the ability to deal with any potential protests on the night.”
You might expect people in positions of power to be able to comprehend which of the parties in question had the least say in the matter but no opportunity to practise the shallow art of populist politics goes untaken.
Villa and the city of Birmingham have become interchangeable villains in the deliberately and dangerously dishonest missives of politicians who have always wanted to keep politics out of football only when it suits their agendas.
British politicians have never had even a working understanding of football or football culture. It exists outside their realm. They simply have no idea what they’re talking about, nor how incendiary their lazy public assumptions can be.
That’s the generous interpretation. It’s quite plain that some of the politicians and assorted hangers-on are very aware that they’re actively inciting violence and that’s not just the notorious pondlife like Michael Gove or habitual troublemakers on the fringes but the Prime Minister and the Leader of the Opposition.
Comments made by Keir Starmer and Kemi Badenoch have been nothing short of despicable. Gove slandered the entire city, a city Starmer and Badenoch seemingly expect to foot the policing bill for a major event it has expressly told Villa it cannot adequately police.
The subsequent storm was bound to happen but lets be clear about a few things.
Villa didn’t ban anyone. Birmingham, through the SAG, has chosen not to permit Villa to hold that particular match with away supporters.
None of the organisations left to figure it out by UEFA’s naked cowardice – not Villa, not the SAG, not West Midlands Police – has said anything at all about Jews, or Jewish fans, or Israelis. Not a word. Nothing about race. Nothing about religion. Nothing about nationality.
That extra spin, that aggressively pointed escalation, has come from politicians who should know better, politicians who know exactly what they’re doing and political fanatics who were itching to get stuck in regardless.
Villa’s name is being dragged through the mud, a symbol of all kinds of absurd allegations about Birmingham’s relationship with Judaism and Islam, and UEFA is to blame.
A football club whose role in the city should be one of unity, the very role our Prime Ministerial cosplayer twisted in his comments, is being held up as an institution of division because of a decision it did not control.
Gove, presumably, would be surprised to learn that there are Jewish Brummies and indeed Jewish Villa supporters who shouldn’t have to reconcile their love for the club with the implications and repercussions of these decisions being left untaken in Nyon.
Villa shouldn’t be the lightning rod for any of this. That was UEFA’s job and it was a dereliction of duty to allow it to become a matter for clubs and their cities.
If people want to keep politics out of football, as so many claim, the first step is to make the difficult geopolitical decisions at the levels of the sport where football is politics.
Politicians with no concept of the actual reasons for the ban are now manoeuvring to undo it, putting people at risk in the name of their safety.
Take whatever side you want but know that this isn’t a football issue. It’s not a Villa issue. It’s not a Birmingham issue. It’s utterly shameful that our club and our city have been left to get caught up in it, then hung out to dry by elected and unelected representatives locally and nationally.
Fortunately, Birmingham is a proud city that keeps its receipts.
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