Four Chelsea fans from the centre of the Paris race row have been banned for a combined total of 18 years.
Munday, 20, Barlklie, 50, Josh Parsons, 21, and William Simpson, 26 all appeared at Stratford Magistrates’ Court as District Judge Gareth Branston gave his decision, and while they contested their bans, three of them were hit with 5 years, with Munday getting 3.
Mobile phone footage was released showing a black man trying to board a train in Paris, ahead of the match between Chelsea and PSG back in February, with the Chelsea fans already on board kicking him off, while singing:
We’re racist, we’re racist, and that’s the way we like it.
Cool. Nice one, lads.
Barklie, of Carrickfergus, Northern Ireland, admitted to pushing Souleymane Sylla, but he claimed that the Frenchman was the one ‘using aggression’.
District Judge Branston said the fans used ‘abhorrent, nasty, offensive and arrogant’ behaviour, saying:
This case concerns four men of previous good character.
The evidence in this case came from the video footage, some of it very clear indeed.
The behaviour of the mob that afternoon, at the forefront of which were Barklie and Parsons, has been seen across the country. It was a racist incident.
It cannot be allowed in a modern society. It needs to be stamped out.
And he’s right. It does.
I go to the game, and love the banter with opposition fans and having a sing song, but this kind of shit has to go. How is it even still a thing in 2015? Every club has dickhead fans, and these four are not representative of all Chelsea fans… There’s ignorant pricks everywhere. Just don’t be one of them.
You’re racist, you’re racist… And that’s why no-one likes you.
