Riots in Nice!

Fan is thrown off the stands - Conference League game has to be postponed

Created: 09/08/2022, 19:36

By: Antonio Jose Riether

Riots in Nice: The Cologne fans attacked the home block.

© dpa

Due to violent clashes in the stadium, the 1. FC Köln game in Nice had to be postponed.

Videos show the brutal scenes.

Nice – Several thousand fans of 1. FC Köln celebrated peacefully and exuberantly on the streets of Nice on Thursday afternoon.

But in the evening the situation in the stadium escalated, serious riots are now causing the kick-off of the Conference League game at OGC Nice, which should have been kicked off at 6.45 p.m., to be postponed.

Riots at the Conference League game between Cologne and Nice

Many videos circulated on Twitter during the game that showed scenes of gross violence.

What happened?

50 hooded Cologne supporters had attacked the French block, the result was a violent confrontation.

According to information from the dpa and television pictures, the fan camps even threw lit bengalos, e-scooters, chairs and tables at each other.

A video shows a fan - probably from the home team Nice - being kicked down the stands by a red-clad supporter.

The attacks lasted about five minutes before the police got the situation under control.

“We wanted to celebrate a football festival with you.

We still want to play, but of course we can't approve of that," said Cologne captain Jonas Hector, who stepped up to the microphone.

"We worked our ass off to qualify for the Conference League and we want to play that too.

Please keep quiet, we want to celebrate football here and not have violence," he added.

Nice captain and ex-FC Bayern professional Dante also tried to influence the fans.

The kick-off in the conference league game is postponed by almost an hour

According to UEFA, the new kick-off time is 7.40 p.m., as announced shortly before 7 p.m.

In the event of another incident, the game will be stopped immediately, according to the stadium announcement.

There is still no information on people arrested, according to the "heute journal" there should be a seriously injured fan.