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This is spot on. Wanna know why attendances aren’t growing? Active is a big part of the issue. I have kids now and can’t sit anywhere near the flogs in active when amateur hour, un-clever chants like “Fuck ‘em all, fuck all the rest” come out. It’s a disgrace. I love watching the support, but the male toxicity (admit it, it’s a sausage fest - minimal chicks) which have all these young blokes feeding off each other’s pack mentality, builds this environment which pushes people further and further until stuff like last night happens, which at the time seems acceptable to those participating, Victory active support does have a far darker, sinister undertone - you can see it in the older thugs, wearing black hoodies covering faces etc, look like they are a gang not football fans. but people outside football see our terrace in the same light when flares are chucked, anti establishment chants with fuck the APL come out. Even look at your city terrace Facebook posts each week, written with anger about chanting, disrespecting opposition etc etc it all builds toxic anger. protest with banners, walk out, do all these things, but honestly, active support is an asset, and a liability - and maybe it really is something that needs to be looked at - is it time to disband a bunch of hot headed blokes on the sauce, and scatter them amongst the crowd. And if this stops you following our football club, maybe you weren’t there to follow and support and be part of our football club, but rather the toxic male pack mentality side of it where you felt part of a tribe who chant abuse and stick together, but that’s about it. this isn’t at all approval for moving the GF to Sydney, that’s still a disgrace, particularly the process. And we should still show peaceful protests and simply boycott finals, First past the post are the premiers. but this is more broadly a question about who really loves football and believes it can grow with new fans when they see the way our active fans behave. I’m a heart Foundation member, I got into aleague after 2006 World Cup when I finally understood the excitement and emotion of football seeing our country do so well. I could never follow victory because I saw back then the thugs and toxic undertone of their active. But I have loved heart/city and being a part of many wins and tough times (including in the terrace years ago), but have always cringed at some of our behaviour - I think if they ban active, for the long haul, maybe they have a better chance. Right now, we go backwards.

The pitch invasion was pre-planned, numerous MVFC supporters with life bans were in attendance with their OSM pals. There was a reason why they all didn't walk out on 20 mins. If you watch the side angle of the video where Gliver throws the flare you can see some of them already starting to go over the fence and security moving in prior to the flare being thrown into the NT. Glover fucked up, n should be punished for that, but he can't be blamed for something that OSM planned to do.

The league needs to take a good look at the rules around active The culture of active support has gone down the wrong path, mostly evident at the Tards, WSW, but also at City and Sydney ... I think the following 3 things should be set in place for active and it would resolve a heap ... 1. No covering faces 2. No swearing in chants 3. No middle finger solutes People will deride me for this, but these 3 things bring a lot of hostility and aggression to the experience, and also attract a certain fringe element who seek anarchy and violence. To me, as a lifetime attendee of a Heart/City games, these 3 things are so dumb and immature and they just add nothing Can active still support loudly and sing passionately without these 3 things? Yes of course they can. The people that need these things as part of their outlet are not really there for the game, they're there for the aggression. And when there is an undercurrent of aggression eventually it'll boil over, like the shameful events of last night's derby

I've slept on my thoughts. In no particular order: We looked good for 22 minutes, although a little fragile in defence, allowing the vist0rs a few chances that a decent team would have converted. O'Neill's a key player for us; it was good to see him finally score. Why do we go through the inconvenience of regular bag searches, and body 'scans', and have to watch security jump on and wrestle a 14 yr old for standing on a seat when 'security services' provide no security whatsoever when they are needed? It looks like Glover threw two flares off the pitch; the first was just over the advertising fence, the second into the first few rows of a seething mob. Whilst this may have triggered the pitch invasion, it was widely advertised before the game, was premeditated, and was NEVER going to help the cause; APL has much evidence to show why a Grand Final should not be held in Melbourne. Both sets of active support seem to attract 'derby specials' who are never there primarily for the game itself; active support groups must actively identify and exclude these people. Flares are not the issue themselves; there were flares at Fed Square; they added to the atmosphere and were barely reported on by the media, and attracted no Police attention, but throwing anything on the pitch is unacceptable APL muzzling franchise media response immediately after the match left an unhealthy media vacuum APL has handled this issue very poorly; if they had thought this through, would they have expected any different fan response and, in particular, a different response from an entitled aggressive ill-disciplined group like visit0rs active support? I feel for the majority of supporters there who had their evening ruined, hundreds of frightened kids, potential lost future supporters, the players and Alex King. I hope the Channel 10 camera man is OK. A day of shame.

Agreed. First they need to recognise the problem and their part in it. One of my strongest emotions out of this is a sense of broken trust with Active. I and so many others trusted them to do this right. But because the issue of hooliganism in their ranks has been overlooked for a long time, it all went very badly wrong, and killed the protests for all the fan groups in the A League. And I really don't like having to say this, because I don't think active leadership are bad people, or had anything but the best intentions. We're all to some extent guilty of overlooking a growing problem. We collectively can't overlook it any longer.

Two things to note for me beyond a deep sense of sadness that we're not talking about a football game lit up by that fabulous O'Neill goal. 1. Despite all that was done by the Victory terrace, on whom much of the blame must lie, we need to get our own house in order. There is a low life element in our own active support which has been getting more prominent. Our active threw several flares onto the pitch, on or near the opposition goalkeeper. That is way beyond acceptable. These people need naming, weeding out and banning. I'm glad some of the photos being circulated are from our end. But there are still far too many prominent voices close to Active who are excusing or covering for these morons. 2. The protests are dead. Any credibility died last night. Finals will be going to Sydney. What case could we make for a final in Melbourne after that? We can't have nice things. Other clubs supporters won't thank us for that. No use saying not us, our supporters were at least partly complicit, even if only a small proportion of the overall damage.

I think JW is right a separate gate for active which can be done pretty easily at AAMI and then a separate styled m/ship card to get into the area (photo ID on it probably) and then yes TornUnder those 3 things as well. Last night was not the end of football in this country it was possibly the end of active and to be honest to lose it and keep football is probably a sacrifice the administrators of the game will take.

For sure. If not last night, then another night. Was it dumb from Glover? Absolutely. But thinking he caused it is probably the most naive thing I've ever heard. ... And I've come to the realisation that as disgusting as the decision was from the APL, it wasn't the reason for last night either. They could have made such a powerful statement together if they wanted to. But they went for violence instead. They're triggers, not the cause. Look at the scenes from last night. Thugs wearing masks grabbing pieces from the advertising boards as they're invading the pitch. So ask yourself this, would you go to a game hiding behind a ski mask if your intention was to make a peaceful walk out protest? This has been brewing for years and years. Only a few months ago that same group went to a local npl match to cause trouble.. and found it. Pigs looking for trouble, just waiting for a spark to start it. ..and then jumping online to play the victim? Well that's just as cowardly as hiding behind masks.

Yes pitch invasion was planned.

Thanks JW a very interesting report, but club owners are bleeding money, always have, the Western United doco revealed they were losing $4.5m a year. My position is this: give fans an opportunity to buy into the club model, maybe make it a 50 +1 ownership model as in Bundesliga, but who amongst us is going to fork out cash knowing it'll be gone in 3-4 years? In reality it's probably not going to work right? That's why this private ownership model is the best we have got, Heart owners only made their money back after City Group paid a nice price to buy in, and they are propping it up too, so this Silver Lake money $140m across 12 clubs, how long is it going to last and what do they intend to invest in to grow their revenues? Okay so no money is probably not accurate but when nearly every club every year is making multi million dollar losses it's not hard to see why certain decisions are made.

I will be staggered if we don't get the 3 points. Glover is not the problem here either, he doesn't help at all I'll admit that and he probably has a few games on the sidelines but I wouldn't want to be in his shoes 10 metres in front of these dickheads back turned as flares are coming his way. We also weren't perfect with throwing flares but I don't think any were particularly close to Izzo and he also hasn't left the ground with a concussion. Both teams will have some sanctions, ours will be very minor compared to them though, but I suspect that's the last derby with fans for a while

Reading a lot of stuff online, it truly amazes me how people are blaming Glover for starting this. How many people went to Fed Square for the Aus v Arg game? It was full of young dickheads lighting flare after flare and then just throwing them into the crowd. But that's ok right? Wouldn't be a stretch to suggest most of those people were also part of the mob who stormed the pitch tonight. Also, where did all those hoons get those white sticks they were throwing on the ground when they finally got kicked out? They just happened to have them in their hands did they? Glover put them there did he? Yeah it was dumb throwing the flare back, but those fukheads were obviously going to do it anyway. What a sad, feral society we have become.

This is the darkest day in our league's history, in what has been the darkest week. I'm devastated.

And you must include the club in your "we." Clubs can't just sit back and trot out the line "we're focussing on the football."

That’s right but look at the statement our active released there was no remorse or an acknowledgment of wrong doing. Sorry guys I’m over active in general bunch of flogs the lot of them

I've had time to reflect on last night and I still struggle to reconcile the fact that for the myriad of reasons this game in this City and country is forever doomed. I cannot see this game ever becoming "normal", "mainstream". It will be always regarded fringe. The actual incident and pitch invasion was avoidable. Seriously they had enough security and Vic Pol present to line the fence at both ends as deterrent. A Glover, FMD, to say he made a bad choice, wow, that's Seriously got to be the dumbest thing he could have done. Izzo had several flares thrown at him, especially aftet we scored. 1 even burnt a hole in the the net, and for every flare thrown at him, he calmy removed of the field to the side and it became a non issue. But Glover hurls is back. What did he think was going to happen. And then to top it off he's got these morons charging at him and he's facing them standing his ground, just dumb. The bloke that I reackon is probably completely blameless was the ref, he actually tried to protect Glover and got covered in the sand. The funniest thing watching the news reports is that a one point as he is getting escorted off he blows his whistle. Anyway I think Glover will cop some suspension but by and large I think the game itself is beyond repair. Very very sad realisation.

That's also a part of the 'toxic masculinity response: entitlement realised through aggression, then playing the victim when exposed.

Blaming Glover is like saying, "look what you've done now, you made me hit you". Nobody should have a flare thrown at them (and it was thrown at him) whilst doing their job. In retrospect, he should have been far more careful about what he did with it but the match was still in progress, he was trying to clear the field. There's also images of visit0r flogs already over the fence before he picked up the flare.

Yes. The young men in front of me in the home end were clearly agitated and waiting to see “something”. That pitch invasion was obviously pre-planned and these blokes knew that it (or something similar) was going to happen.

No argument with you. The issue is transparency. Indeed, what is being done with the $140m from Silver Lake? No different from your local council, State government, Commonwealth Government etc. etc. - massive expenditures and you can't see anything, or much, from it all. APL itself? What's the management structure? How much are these guys getting paid in salaries and expenses? Where is all the money going? Did we just double up on Football Australia?

I think Glover has to be sanctioned. But really, I don't think anyone - APL, AAMI Park, Security, City or Victory - got themselves properly prepared for this match. Melbourne was going to be the flashpoint and no-one did enough.

Ask yourself this question. If Glover has quietly picked up the flare and put it in the bucket would there have been a riot?

Am I the only one who thinks any publicity is good publicity?