‘Sick’ attacks on Leipzig fans shock Germany

BERLIN: An RB Leipzig fan has described how hooligans in Dortmund attacked their group, which included children, with stones and bottles and levels of hatred towards the Red Bullbacked club which have shocked German football.

Hooliganism is nothing new in German football, but Saturday’s violence meted out to RB Leipzig supporters, including young families, was a brutal fresh low.

Some of the terrified 8,000 RB Leipzig supporters, who saw their team lose 1- 0 in front of 81,360 at Dortmund’s intimidating Signal Iduna Park stadium, were attacked en route to the game.

“On the way to the Borussia stadium, the (rival) fans weren’t separated,” RB Leipzig fan Lars H. told German daily Bild.

“They threw eggs, cans, bottles and stones at us, flags and scarves were torn away.

“Our children were pushed and attacked, we had to get them to the sides. There were several people injured, some with lacerations.

“In eight years of being a fan I’ve never experienced anything as bad as in Dortmund.”

Hatred from rival fans is something RasenBal lsport Leipzig, founded by Red Bull in 2009, has had to deal with on the path to Germany’s top tier.

Following four promotions in seven years they are perceived as a threat to all things good about German football because of the obvious commercialism they represent.

RasenBallsport -GrassBallsport -- is a fabricated German word to get around the ban on Bundesliga clubs bearing a sponsor’s name.

The Bundesliga’s “50+1” rule stops clubs being run by a single rich investor and its members must have a controlling share, except RB Leipzig has just 17 members -- who are all essentially Red Bull employees.

At the start of the season, Borussia’s CEO Hans- Joachim Watzke was one of RB’s most outspoken critics, saying Leipzig “play football to perform for cans of drink”.

The head of a severed bull was thrown into the playing area when Leipzig lost a German Cup match at Dynamo Dresden in August.

And home fans in Cologne staged a sit- down protest which blocked the RB team bus and meant the kick- off for a league game was delayed in September.

But Dortmund was something else. — AFP