In the shadow of football temples, billion-dollar balls and megalomaniac takeovers, clubs live on the margins. Where the enthusiast is still courted with history, character and sincere romance. For the section Cult clubs is reading Football zone from the fairy tale books of the football library. In this edition: Millwall FC, the cult club that is known for its fighting culture, but is now also just a football club.
By Kevin van Buuren
When Luton Town and Millwall FC meet on March 13, 1985 for the quarter-finals in the FA Cup, things are quickly unsettled. The train in which Millwall fans arrive is already severely beaten. Subsequently, ticket sales spiral into a stampede, leaving far too many Lions enter the stadium. Under the guise the show must go on these omens, including the fact that Millwall supporters are already invading the home section before kick-off, are naively ignored. After fourteen minutes the referee stops the game. The local police enter the stands to stop the violence. It rains golf and billiard balls and Luton goalkeeper Les Sealey even has to dodge a knife. Despite all the mindless crimes in the stands, the football association and referee do their part: the game finally hears its final whistle. Not early, but after ninety minutes of football with lines of police officers on the chalk lines. Luton Town win 1-0.
Then – shockingly – only the worst violence follows. Kenilworth Road stadium seats are ripped loose and fired at fans, staff and police. The Guardian call it the evening’where football died a slow death. Miraculously, ‘only’ 47 people were injured, 31 were arrested. In doing so, an additional catalyst was revealed: Chelsea and West Ham United fans were among the instigators of violence. The Times reported about a Chelsea supporter who came home to find his bedding outside: “If you act like a beast, you might as well sleep like that,” his parents are said to have said. Luton Town vows ‘never to play Millwall at home again’, transforms the stadium into one all seater where only registered members are welcome and eventually plays for four years without a single away supporter – even if they are not allowed to participate in the EFL Cup in 1986/87, they do not deviate from the measure. Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher is also fed up. After the umpteenth case in England, she sets up a ‘war cabinet’. In addition, it is trying to implement a registered membership system throughout the country: the Football Spectator Actwhich finally comes into force in 1989.
The Millwall Bushwackers
For many hooligans from Millwall in London, such consequences are like an enrichment of the CV. The club has long been associated with hooliganism in England. As a lurid marketing stunt, the violent fans from 1960 took advantage of the media attention for the football phenomenon. This so-called British disease was increasingly observed in Europe. England, because of its status in football development, scale, and seriousness, was seen as the source of evil. Nevertheless, hooliganism was not a modern phenomenon. Before football became professional, rival villages already fought against each other. The Den, Millwall’s stadium, was built for its heyday from the sixties already closed five times due to violent crimes. But as football became more organized, the violent organizations also structured.
In 1965, the proverbial explosion of conflict was symbolized by the headline: “Football Marches to War!”. Although thrill seeker The Sun conceived it, the occasion justified the writing. On November 6, a Millwall fan throws a hand grenade on the pitch at Griffin Park in Brentford. It later turns out to be a harmless replica. In the decades that followed, the 1970s and 1980s, the belligerent F Troop furore in England. These hooligans, later renamed the Millwall Bushwackers make life miserable for rival fans. The Sports Journal describes their reputation as ‘hard and crazy’. Divided into young members, the Underfives, whose job it is to pick a fight; then the older one appears treatment group, who give snapping brawlers an appropriate ‘treatment’. If all that isn’t enough, thirty to forty-year-olds are called criminal record carriers the surgery to live up to their name. Usually by deforming their victims in such a way that only a plastic surgeon can reverse it.
The New Den, home of the Millwall Bushwackers
More incidents
Although almost every club in England had its own thug group at the time, the reputation of violence instigators continues to haunt Millwall. Towards the 1980s, the most notorious members of the Milwall Bushwackers from the scene. In addition, more and more security regulations are being introduced in the stadiums, such as the Spectator Act. Still, the violence around football is not abating. In May 2002 the Birmingham riot takes place. A new rival, the same protagonist. After a loss to Birmingham City, Millwall fans clash with the revelers and eventually the police. 47 officers and 24 horses are injured, after which the London police force charges Millwall FC. Theo Paphitis, then president of the club, points to the bigger picture. “It’s not just a Millwall problem, not a football problem, it’s a problem that plagues our whole society.”
Paphitis is right, yet Millwall continues to get involved in incidents. Although it is no longer called that. Also on August 25, 2009 it will be outside Upton Park, the former stadium of West Ham United. It is a recent example of the fierce rivalry between the two, which is depicted in the film, among other things Green Street Hooligans. A stabbed Millwall fan is among the 20 injured that day. Such injuries are not the first, or the last. Still in 2019, Everton supporter Jay Burns is cut in the face with a knife by a Millwall hooligan. England is not yet cured of the British disease, but due to strict stadium bans, mandatory seating and alcohol bans in stadiums, violence has been firmly limited in recent years. Football journalist Phil McNulty docks the NOS from: “I can’t remember a recent incident like the lighter on Klaassen’s head. That hasn’t happened for a long time.” Then, about the fan who attacked Arsenal goalkeeper Aaron Ramsdale in January 2023: “He has a four-year stadium ban, 100 hours community service and must pay Ramsdale compensation. And if Tottenham plays abroad, the police can take his passport.” Nowadays you can’t get away with anything in England, thanks to registration and advanced camera systems in the stadiums.
The Millwall fans and the authorities are no strangers, or friends, to each other
Just a football club
Beyond the surreal headlines, brawls and negative reputation, Millwall is still just a football club, and an old one. The association was founded in 1885 under the name Millwall Rovers by workers from JT Morton’s factory. It reached the semi-finals of the FA Cup in 1900 and 1903, but is mainly active in the lower regions. A fourth tier championship (in 1961/62), second tier in 1887/88 and third tier in 2000/01 are the club’s only trophies. Millwall does play an FA Cup final against Manchester United in 2004, in which it loses 3-0. The club’s heyday coincides with the heyday of the hooligans, around 1970. Between 1964 and 1967, Millwall go 59 home games unbeaten, under the management of managers Billy Gray and Benny Fenton.
In 1988, the club manages to play at the highest level in England for the first time in history. In the predecessor of the Premier League, it is even at the top for a while, partly due to top striker Teddy Sheringham, who later scored goals at Tottenham Hotspur and Manchester United, among others. It may stay for a year, but at the end of 1989/90 it is relegated from the first division of England, where it will not return (for the time being). Their rivals don’t mind, the supporters themselves think. The slogan has been heard in The New Den stadium for decades: “No one likes us, we don’t care!”. Its 20,000 spectator capacity saw it open in 1993, succeeding the Old Den, which had been used by Millwall since 1910. The club, now playing in the Championship (second tier), hopes to make the news in the future mainly sporting. In any case, this succeeded in the Netherlands, when former player of Fortuna Sittard Zian Flemming signed for the Londoners in July 2022.
Zian Flemming is the new Dutch star of Millwall.