NIGHT OF TERROR IN THE STADIUM... FULL REPORT AND PICTURES
The police had decided the game should continue, they did not want a panicky stampede for the exits
EVERYTHING had been normal until the noise of first one loud explosion, followed minutes later by a second, ripped around the Stade de France. The look on France defender Patrice Evra’s face as he offloaded the ball just after the second deafening bang betrayed feelings shared by all of us present — ‘What the hell was that?’
If you were in the military, the police, or had faced terror at close hand before, you would have known for sure they were bombs.
But no one inside the ground had an inkling of what had happened — some supporters even cheered the bangs — yet the sound was haunting. It could not have been fireworks.
Perhaps people just didn’t want to believe they had heard bombs detonating — the prestigious friendly between Euro 2016 hosts France and World Cup winners Germany was still going on. They would have stopped it if it was really bad, wouldn’t they?
It was only at half-time, the poor-quality wifi having forced me to return to to the Press room to check facts and write my report, that the first clue something really terrible was guard who asked to be identified only by his first name, Zouheir, and confirmed by police explains why the attacks failed to cause the carnage that occurred across Paris. Had any of the bombers gained entry or carried out their murderous act in the busy bars pre-match, the death toll would have been huge.
Even as I arrived at my hotel a stone’s throw from the ground at about 2pm, there was an air of apprehension surrounding the game. Switching on the television, the first story was that of a bomb threat at the German team’s hotel.
Players and technical staff had been evacuated and went sightseeing at Roland Garros until they were allowed back after the all-clear — but the tone had been set. The memory of January’s attack on the offices and staff of the Charlie Hebdo magazine was still all happening started to formulate. I missed the muffled sound of a third explosion while inside, but Twitter was filling up with information regarding not only incidents at the Stade de France but elsewhere in a co-ordinated series of attacks on the capital. It was time to text home to say I was OK.
The explosions clearly happened near the stadium but we were not aware until after the match that the first two were actually at the turnstiles.
Yesterday, it emerged that at least one of the attackers had a ticket to the game but blew himself up at the turnstiles after a security guard discovered he was wearing an explosives vest. About three minutes later, a second person also blew himself up outside the stadium and a third suicide attacker detonated explosives at a nearby McDonald’s.
The account, from a security
too fresh, and security for Euro 2016 already moving up the priority agenda.
Still, I had walked up to the ground on a perfect late-autumn afternoon under a piercing blue sky wondering how French stars Karim Benzema and Mathieu Valbuena would ever play for Les Bleus together again after their court case over an alleged sex tape blackmail.
How incredibly banal and trivial that affair seems now, France having suffered its worst ever peacetime attacks.
And how different the agenda was at the final whistle, France having won 2-0 through goals from Arsenal’s Olivier Giroud and Andre-Pierre Gignac.
None of the Press corps wanted to talk about the action and neither manager nor any of the players emerged to speak to us. All Press conferences were cancelled, and only an ashen-faced Noel Le Graet, president of the Federation Francaise de Football, spoke to the media, confirming the numbers killed outside the ground but assuring the public that the stadium was secure.
Fans from three sides of the Stade were evacuated, with thousands from the closed side gathering on the pitch and eventually clearing an hour after the final whistle. Many showed the light would not be extinguished, breaking into spontaneous renditions of La Marseillaise.
Outside, by this stage, many supporters were still milling around, perhaps too afraid to brave the trip home, perhaps still deep in shock.
As with friendlies at Wembley, there were hundreds of young fans, many of them in tears. One France supporter I spoke to, with his two young sons, said there had been confusion as to what had happened. Indeed, many people were still unaware at the final whistle. Should the match have been stopped? The police decided at half-time that the threat lay outside the ground and not inside — in addition they did not want to provoke a panicked stampede for the exits. This was probably the right call. Back in the Press room with work done, the mood grew ever more sombre as the horrific details emerged. This shouldn’t happen at football matches or anywhere else, and I experienced the same numb feeling as when watching and hearing the Heysel, Hillsborough and Bradford disasters unfold.
I left at about 2.45am, the same time as the German Press corps, who were taken in coaches to their hotels. The teams were still inside, with Germany staying all night.
My route back was now cordoned off, with armed police and forensics teams everywhere. To gain access to my hotel three armed officers had to escort me in.
Swiftly established border controls saw lengthy queues for the Eurotunnel yesterday lunchtime and I was questioned by counterterrorism police, once they realised where I had been. The intelligence-gathering operation was being cranked up but it was not a day to worry about some slight delays. At least most of us got home, and all thoughts were for those who did not return from a Friday night out in Paris.