A harmful habit of radical groups associated with football is to meet and beat each other, agreeing on rules of the game that are not to use sticks or knives, but only physical force. That is precisely what several members of the Atlético de Madrid and Feyenoord ultras did this week, taking advantage of the fact that both teams were playing a Champions League match. According to police sources, they met on Tuesday in a forest in Madrid and fought for a short time. Despite the reasons for the appointment, the Police have not opened an investigation since no complaint has been filed.
The meeting between the members of the Atlético Front and the Rotterdam Jongeren Kern and Firm FIIIR groups, both fans of the Dutch team, took place last Tuesday in a wooded area of Madrid, according to the newspaper ABC. A day later, during the Champions League match between both football teams, Feyenoord fans caused disturbances in a VIP area of the Metropolitan Stadium and six people were arrested.
Five were arrested for alleged crimes of injury and one for an attack against authority. All those arrested are men between 20 and 52 years old, in addition to a minor under 17 years old. However, the fight before the game was agreed upon, secret and far from the eyes of the Police. It barely lasted a few minutes, as is common in this type of encounter between ultra groups.
More than 4,000 Feyenoord fans traveled to Madrid and in the days before the match they carried out other acts of vandalism, such as the painting of a huge graffiti on a wall with the Almudena Cathedral and other monuments in the background of the landscape, according to the ABC information.
Ultra groups usually agree that these fights only use physical force, although they can use mouth guards, helmets and bandages typical of mixed martial arts. Sometimes, officers are able to thwart these types of confrontations. At the end of September, the National Police stopped two gatherings of ultra groups from Sevilla and Betis with others from the French Lens and Cádiz, respectively.
