CARD statement following Unity Protest in Belgium
More than 100 supporters of a wide age range travelled to Belgium by coach and they were joined by many dozens of others who had made their own way from England by rail and road. The fans kept in touch with events at Sixfields via commentary relay to the coaches and a video link to the pre-march buffet, where Addicks protest band The 2percent also performed.
They were then accompanied by a small contingent of Sint-Truiden fans for the procession through the town to Stayen, home of Duchatelet’s Belgian club, STVV. Police estimated total numbers at about 300. The owner was at the stadium but did not show himself during the demonstration, which was covered by both local and London television outlets, and a range of other media.
The exemplary conduct of Charlton fans was underlined by the tweet posted by local police chief Steve Provost, with whom CARD had liaised extensively before the day. He said: “Nice demonstration #cafc, good agreement with the organisers, perfect execution by [police] colleagues.”
CARD also welcomed the sensible and proportionate policing of the march. But it contrasted the fans' conduct with the prior claims of Duchatelet, who called disaffected supporters “vinegar pissers” in a local newspaper and said the police chief and town mayor would have to take responsibility for the "consequences" of allowing the demonstration.
In a statement to the Guardian newspaper, published on Saturday, the club also said: “We would request that anyone travelling to protest in Belgium this weekend will conduct themselves in an appropriate and respectful manner.”
A CARD spokesperson said: “It appears to be Roland Duchatelet who needs advice on how to conduct himself in an ‘appropriate and respectful manner’. He has previously called protest organisers ‘stupid people’, misognynists and ex-employees. Charlton must have had a huge turnover of staff if all those in Belgium were ex-employees.’
“The club also misled some national journalists into believing it was transporting all 1,400 travelling fans to Northampton. They ran five coaches and had made clear from the outset that they were not prepared to run more than that. They took 258 people, which is no bad thing, but they could not even be honest and transparent about that.
"The regime has long demonstrated its poor judgement, but this was both naive and desperate, even unethical. It is yet more evidence of the management's incompetence, as is the team’s plunge towards possible relegation to League Two, despite one of the biggest budgets in the division. Duchatelet and chief executive Katrien Meire have no idea what they are doing, which has been evident to many fans for some time.
“The protest in Sint-Truiden went well beyond our expectations and in addition to CARD’s role we want to acknowledge the part played in delivering it by the Belgium 20 group, as well as Women Against the Regime (WAR). It was months in the planning, so it was not just about recent results, but three years of hopeless management of the club - confirmed by the team’s league position, the emptying Valley and thumping financial losses.
“If necessary we will return to Belgium in even larger numbers in future, but we would much prefer that Duchatelet makes arrangements to sell the club before that happens. We fear for its future if he remains in control.”
Comments
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Excellent work.
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If only our club was as organised as well as CARD.6
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Can this be translated into Dutch and sent to a Belgian Newspaper? This could completely embarrass Messr. Duchatelet in his homeland17
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The club's default position is to lie - it sums up Duchatelet. He can call us vinegar pissers all he wants, but if Charlton fans did not stand up and fight for the club in the past, we probably wouldn't have a club. We don't just complain, we actively put ourselves out to do something about things and this is only going to grow. To stop us he has two options. The first is to sell the club and the second isn't really an option as it is to run the club properly - something he has shown himself incapable of doing. It is telling that we have had 8 managers during his ownership and some of them have been decent without the necessary support, but we have only had one CEO who is the laughing stock of football.18
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Did Roland allow you guys access to his personal Saturday Stream (not piss), that was nice of him, maybe he's not as bad as we all thought?0
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If there are no positive indicators for the club being sold, it may be worth doing another visit in July ?
If it was thought to be a good idea, a weekend date could be announced, so anyone who may be interested could keep their diaries free and there would also be no clashing with the fixture list.
We could take 1,000 ?18 -
Roland must be so pissed off it didn't all kick off. If he was organised he would have hired some thugs to cause trouble. Perhaps he left that with Meire and they'll turn up next weekend ...15
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Agreed CE - sufficient notice and a weekend still would guarantee much bigger numbers, esp if the unthinkable happens this season.
Hope something is arranged with Cov next month.6 -
No they went to Northampton.mogodon said:Roland must be so pissed off it didn't all kick off. If he was organised he would have hired some thugs to cause trouble. Perhaps he left that with Meire and they'll turn up next weekend ...
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It's no doubt be metioned already, but 'Vinegar Pissers' is crying out to be 'reclaimed ' and used by CARD et al.
'Je suis Vinegar Pisser' springs to mind.
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Would it not be better to wait for when STVV are at home again? Their season may actually start late July .Covered End said:If there are no positive indicators for the club being sold, it may be worth doing another visit in July ?
If it was thought to be a good idea, a weekend date could be announced, so anyone who may be interested could keep their diaries free and there would also be no clashing with the fixture list.
We could take 1,000 ?
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I don't think we can get a 1000 out there. 500 maybe.0
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By all means, although being joined by 20 of their fans, made little difference. It may of course be slightly better numbers next time & of course some of our fans may well want to go to a STTV game/ the stadium.PragueAddick said:
Would it not be better to wait for when STVV are at home again? Their season may actually start late July .Covered End said:If there are no positive indicators for the club being sold, it may be worth doing another visit in July ?
If it was thought to be a good idea, a weekend date could be announced, so anyone who may be interested could keep their diaries free and there would also be no clashing with the fixture list.
We could take 1,000 ?
I'm just putting an idea forward, as so many fans said they wanted to go, but couldn't for various reasons, such as the short notice, clashing with a Charlton game, when train tickets had already been bought, pre planned family events etc etc.
A date could be suggested & if nearer the time it doesn't seem appropriate then it doesn't go ahead.
As long as everyone is clear that it's a suggested date only and if anyone books up anything it's at their own risk, until the date is confirmed.
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Just had a small report on BBC London News. It described (in broad strokes) the reasons behind the protest and was supportive in tone.0
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Very professional in all aspects; planning, liaison with authorities, information, execution and now the final message. In complete contrast to the amatuer performance by the ownership and management team.
How much are they paying that PR company? Money down the drain (again). theyd be better served giving it to charity.14 -
@Covered End i was thinking mainly that if STVV are at home, he is most likely to be there, which I think is important. And a home game gave a fair few of us the opportunity to get up to more mischief.
I also think , like @bolloxbolder that 400 -500 is the best we can hope for. And if we really brought more I think the local police might get worried. They did well I thought, but its the sort of place where a stolen bike would be a big deal. 400 of us plus 50 STVV would look pretty impressive.
But I am up for it.5 -
Would be best to avoid the school holidays so early July better than late.PragueAddick said:@Covered End i was thinking mainly that if STVV are at home, he is most likely to be there, which I think is important. And a home game gave a fair few of us the opportunity to get up to more mischief.
I also think , like @bolloxbolder that 400 -500 is the best we can hope for. And if we really brought more I think the local police might get worried. They did well I thought, but its the sort of place where a stolen bike would be a big deal. 400 of us plus 50 STVV would look pretty impressive.
But I am up for it.0 -
Makes sense as well. I think as much notice as possible and not clashing with a CAFC fixture are key.PragueAddick said:@Covered End i was thinking mainly that if STVV are at home, he is most likely to be there, which I think is important. And a home game gave a fair few of us the opportunity to get up to more mischief.
I also think , like @bolloxbolder that 400 -500 is the best we can hope for. And if we really brought more I think the local police might get worried. They did well I thought, but its the sort of place where a stolen bike would be a big deal. 400 of us plus 50 STVV would look pretty impressive.
But I am up for it.1 -
Let us hope it's the beginning of the end. Well done CARD and all who participated
In the words of Henry Irving - you bought the wrong club7 -
Fair play. Great effort29
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Roland, you are currently pissing in my vinegar you cretin. Sell the club.4
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Here is a helpful summary of the crazy Belgian league structure....(plagiarised from wiki)
There are 16 teams in the league, the standard season runs until next game which is m, for Sint truiden, away. This is the reason that the protest was this weekend, the last guaranteed home game until.....
The team in 16th place is relegated and goes into no play off pools, the next season started in late July.
The top 6 teams get to play twice each against each other between now and early May for the winner of the league position.
The 9 teams from 7-15 plus 3 teams from the division below are split into two groups of six who play a mini league twice against each other between now and end May, the winners of each of these mini-leagues play each other once.
The winner of this match plays the 5th place team from the top group to see who gets the Europa league spot
Sint truiden will be in this lower playoff run, but fixtures will not be announced until after their next game.
Hope that's clear.
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Alwaysneil said:
Here is a helpful summary of the crazy Belgian league structure....(plagiarised from wiki)
There are 16 teams in the league, the standard season runs until next game which is m, for Sint truiden, away. This is the reason that the protest was this weekend, the last guaranteed home game until.....
The team in 16th place is relegated and goes into no play off pools, the next season started in late July.
The top 6 teams get to play twice each against each other between now and early May for the winner of the league position.
The 9 teams from 7-15 plus 3 teams from the division below are split into two groups of six who play a mini league twice against each other between now and end May, the winners of each of these mini-leagues play each other once.
The winner of this match plays the 5th place team from the top group to see who gets the Europa league spot
Sint truiden will be in this lower playoff run, but fixtures will not be announced until after their next game.
Hope that's clear.
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I think we could definitely get 500 out there, 1,000 might be a bit of a push but I wouldn't rule it out.3
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IMHO any further protests in ST need to be on a home match day (ST match day). The media attention and overall effect seems to be more impacting on a match day and numbers will be swelled by ST fans on the day.
I can't imagine us organising a march down Floyd Rd. when we are not at home.
End of July is great but ST need to be at home.
I was one of the 'unable to attend' brigade for this weekend just passed but from many accounts ST is a quiet, sleepy town and I get the feeling we might look a little odd marching through the streets on a non match day.
Just my opinion. I wasn't there.2 -
Blimey @Alwaysneil how do you know this stuff, made me giddy just reading it!0
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I looked it up. Took me three goes to understand enough of it to write it back down.4
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I think a home game would be much better, even if it meant less numbers.25May98 said:IMHO any further protests in ST need to be on a home match day (ST match day). The media attention and overall effect seems to be more impacting on a match day and numbers will be swelled by ST fans on the day.
I can't imagine us organising a march down Floyd Rd. when we are not at home.
End of July is great but ST need to be at home.
I was one of the 'unable to attend' brigade for this weekend just passed but from many accounts ST is a quiet, sleepy town and I get the feeling we might look a little odd marching through the streets on a non match day.
Just my opinion. I wasn't there.0 -
I'd love to see something similar to the beach balls/pigs in ST. So a larger march than this weekend, with more STTV fans involved, maybe other clubs from the network too, and then disrupt their game.
This would have to be something that the ST fans would take a lead on though.1 -
Nice idea. Someone went so far as to get quotes from alibaba for pigs with charlton and stvv logos on them, then discussed the idea of an in game protest with the locals and got laughed out of town.
To put this in context, during the game over the weekend while I was at the bar, there was a large rendition of just sell the club from the fans in the north stand.
This was received very badly by the local support there who believe that during the game, you support the team, and after the game you can criticise.
Given this is the current feeling, I am afraid the pigs were shelved for the time being.
I remember being massively against in game protests at the start of our journey and had some very heated debates over one of the first protests in game where something was to happen at a set point in the game. The north stand stopped singing as they were waiting for that moment and in my view at the time, Charlton stopped playing as the support stopped.
I quickly got over that after some sensible words from fellow fans and I became a supporter of in game protests.
It wasn't an easy journey and it is not one that current Sint truiden fans have started on.6
