The police recently issued a summary of the law and order situation in Swedish elite football during 2023, and stated that the number of matches with “serious law and order” and “serious incidents” increased sharply. Afterwards, Per Engström, section manager at the police’s national operational department, thought that organizers should take greater responsibility in the future, and that clubs should consider playing matches in front of empty stands – if this is required in serious situations of law and order.
Swedish Elite Football (stakeholder organization for the clubs in Allsvenskan and Superettan) then presented a new plan to deal with disorder, where part of the message was that there are no new rules regarding emptying stands. It has only previously been included as a possibility as a last resort at a match meeting.
Per Eliasson, responsible for security at Swedish Elite Soccer (Sef), claimed in an interview with Expressen that emptying the stands was never a topic to be discussed with the police.
– We have not discussed it (emptying stands, ed. note) with them, Eliasson told the newspaper.
According to fotbollsthlm.se however, Eliasson himself proposed to the Police Authority to empty the stands in the event of disturbances. The site has seen emails between Eliasson and police chief Engström where he sent a 51-page powerpoint presentation and the Sef-toppen is said to have written, among other things, the following:
“Must make clear that a closed section/arena is not a return to the condition ladder – it is a consequence of disrespectful behavior by a number of supporters which means we need to take the next step in the exclusion strategy to continue creating safe and secure events.”
Eliasson claims that emptying stands is an extension of the exclusion strategy and that the email to Engström should not be interpreted as a proposal for measures.
– What we mean is that the exclusion strategy is the basis for everything. We must always strive to find solutions that ensure that we find the individuals who commit the crimes as accurately as possible, that they are prosecuted and are not allowed to enter our arenas. But part of maintaining good order is emptying a section in certain situations. It is an extension of the exclusion strategy. The exclusion strategy always applies, we agree on that, but we also have to dare to say that there may be situations where we have to ensure the order and security of the event. Then that action may become necessary. But it’s nothing new, the organizer has always had that opportunity, he says the site.
The exclusionary strategy aims to punish individuals, via banning by prosecutors or via organizer suspension by the club concerned instead of the previous model of the conditional ladder, which many clubs saw as collective punishment. Through the condition ladder, the police could, for example, reduce capacity through organizer conditions.
According to fotbollsthlm.se shouldn’t Eliasson have anchored “stand emptying” at the clubs before he suggested it to the police. He must have sent his email to Engström on November 23, 2023. The security group within Sef – which consists of the security managers of AIK, Djurgården, Hammarby, IFK Gothenburg and Malmö FF – discussed new proposals regarding security directives on December 4, 2023.
– It is not a proposal. It was a reflection on things that had happened. The discussion we had at the beginning of December with the security officers was of a different type, where they talked about what measures we should look at. This was more of a reflection on the season that we had just put behind us, Eliasson answers to the site, when asked how well established the email to Engström was among the clubs.
Sef has another body for safety issues, safety prevails, which consists of the CEOs of all 32 elite clubs. Fotbollsthlm states that it has been in contact with several people from both bodies and no one should have known about Eliasson’s email to Engström.
The football club has applied for Per Eliasson.
2024-03-14 19:36:00
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