STAMPEDE A WAKE-UP CALL: FIFA

But Blatter promises the incident at friendly won’t happen in the Finals

JOHANNESBURG: Fifa president Sepp Blatter has described the fan stampede during a Nigeria-North Korea friendly on Sunday as a “wake-up call” but promised that there would be no repeat at the World Cup which kicks off on Friday.

PHOTO: AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSEPolicemen standing at the site where a fence collapsed at the Makhulong Stadium during Sunday’s friendly game.

Said the head of football’s world governing body yesterday: “I’m sure that this is a wake-up call and this will not happen in any match, you can be assured.”

General secretary Jerome Valcke felt that the incident at Makhulong Stadium in a township near Johannesburg, which resulted in about 20 injuries, had illustrated the danger of selling tickets on match days which Fifa has refused to do for the month-long Finals.

“We have been criticised very often for not distributing tickets on match day at the stadium and it’s what happened there,” he said.

“It’s good for us because it proved we are right to say that you should never distribute tickets at the stadium on the match day.

“The level or organisation we have when we organise a game is definitely higher than the one we have seen there,” he added. “We have to make sure the police working around the World Cup stadiums will do better than what we saw.”

Fifa had initially sought to distance itself from the stampede, which raised new security fears in the final countdown to the tournament.

“This friendly match has no relation whatsoever with the operational organisation of the 2010 Fifa World Cup, for which we remain fully confident,” it had said in an earlier statement.

But the headlines on the front pages of South African newspapers and papers worldwide made uncomfortable reading for the organisers, who have long had to fend off claims that South Africa’s beleaguered security forces will struggle to keep order.

“Soccer Stampede Mayhem”, read the headline in The Star, which quoted one of those injured as having feared for her life.

Officials said one police officer was seriously injured as a mass of supporters without tickets tried to force their way into the ground.

Police spokesman Eugene Opperman said that 8,000 free tickets had been distributed ahead of the match but other fans without tickets had tried to push their way in shortly before the kick-off. “There were supposed to be only 8,000 tickets – they were all free,” he told AFP.

Police said it was not immediately clear who had distributed the tickets and Fifa said it had nothing to do with them. “Contrary to some media reports, Fifa had nothing to do with the ticketing of this game,” its statement said.

The episode served as a sharp reminder of the challenges facing the tournament, which begins on Friday when the hosts play Mexico, and evoked ugly memories of previous crowd trouble in South Africa.

Fifa has been urging fans to get matches on time.

The incident on Sunday came just hours after South African President Jacob Zuma announced that everything was ready for the tournament – the first to be held in the continent.

to