Is this the end of England’s Ultras? | OneFootball

The disbanding of the Crystal Palace supporter group the Holmesdale Fanatics feels like an important moment for fan culture in English football.

For 20 years the self-styled Ultras group have brought a vibrancy and atmosphere to Selhurst Park, making it one of the more enjoyable and interesting away days. On the road, the group played a vital part in Palace’s excellent away support on their road to winning the Europa Conference League last season.

But just days after new Palace boss Pierre Sage said how much he was looking forward to the Selhurst atmosphere, the group announced enough was enough and they were calling time.

English football Ultras

Historically, England didn’t have an ultra movement. The game was born from the working classes, and relied on pockets of supporters placed in certain parts of the stadium to generate noise. If you wanted to be part of that, you’d get a ticket in the “singing end”.

Beyond that though there was no other organisation or movement to bring fans together for many decades. That changed in the 1970s and 80s, which were marred by hooliganism and organised gang violence.

Supporters disenfranchised with society and politics formed gangs known as “casuals” or “firms” and were distinctive in their clothes and their haircuts.

At the height of the subculture hooligan movement, there were around 40 or 50 known hooligan gangs, the Millwall Bushwackers, Chelsea Headhunters and West Ham’s Inter City Firm among the most notorious.

A visit from one of those would bring with it knives, bottles, bricks and some proper headcases.

Changing times

As hooliganism waned in the 1990s – a mix of legal crackdowns, upgraded stadiums (the Hillsborough disaster of 1989 put an end to terracing and forced all seater stadium into being) and shifting societal attitudes – football in England began changing.

The rubicon came in 1992 and the formation of the Premier League. With global television rights bringing unseen-before riches into the game, and club and television executives didn’t want trouble at its doors.

Ticket prices went up, more women and families were made welcome at stadiums, grounds improved and so did security. Foreign players began arriving and age-old ties between football clubs and the close knit communities around them started to wane.

It was the first step of the working man truly being forced out of the game for whom it was created. And whilst it made football safer and a more enjoyable experience for the average supporter, increasingly in modern times it has killed the atmospheres. Long gone are the febrile, raucous grounds where you felt forever on the edge of something kicking off and away players felt a jolt of unease running out onto the pitch.

Those supporters, mostly in their late teens and 20s, wanting some of that back, looked to Europe and the Ultras movement there for inspiration.

What defines an Ultra

Simply, it can be many things, ranging from the type Crystal Palace fans envisioned to some of the Italians who make the hooligans of the 1980s look like choirboys.

In England they are largely an organised group of supporters looking to improve atmosphere, create community and link the club and fanbase to the history and culture of what came before it. To make football an active participation event, not just passive consumption.

At their most intense the Ultras congregate in specific sections, wear uniform black clothing, hang banners, wave flags and beat drums, and are relentlessly singing. Essentially their role is to ensure support, noise and vibrancy for 90 minutes to help the team, win lose or draw.

Less formal groups such as the “Wor Flags” movement at Newcastle United have done an unbelievably good job at enhancing the matchday atmosphere at St James’ Park – anyone who has been there for matchday will have had a shiver sent down the spine as the teams come out.

In 2022 the “Ashburton Army” formed at Arsenal to kickstart a moribund atmosphere at the Emirates and issue a reminder of the Highbury heyday.

Rage against the machine

Part of Palace’s Holmesdale Fanatics ideals were about fighting back against the commercialisation and modernisation of the game.

In a long and emotional statement announcing its disbandment, it laid the door firmly at the feet of “modern football”, blaming the “sanitisation” of the game and “draconian restrictions” being placed upon supporters.

They argued sky high ticket prices had killed a new generation of young fans from getting hooked on football. The atmosphere the ground had changed to a culture of people turning up expecting to be entertained rather than trying to play and active role in influencing the result. Kick off times are forever getting moved with the weekend Premier League fixture round now being played across Friday, Saturday, Sunday and Monday.

Away from home, they were banned from taking flags and other materials (presumably they mean flares here), with coaches stopped and fans arrested.

Their particular ire, asking where the young supporters are coming from, is fully justified. Young people want that sense of belonging, brotherhood, and collective identity that mirrors classic youth subcultures.

And they didn’t just stick to Palace – they were vociferous protestors against the Saudi PIF takeover at Newcastle United.

In-fighting at Palace

As Monty Python brilliantly satirised during the People’s Front of Judea sketch in The Life of Brian, the biggest challenge to Ultras is most commonly other Ultras, splits, factions and splinter groups.

Palace certainly suffered from that, with the Holmesdale Fanatics (HF) regularly targeted by another Palace fan group linked to a more far-right viewpoint. It got so bad that it made headlines at the away Conference League game in Strasbourg with the two sets of supporters fighting each other.

The HF also never really got the club on board, for many of the reasons stated above. I always felt Chairman Steve Parish and the Board at Palace should have welcomed HF with open arms and made them part of the Palace culture. But it never happened, and there will be reasons on both sides why.

Is this a warning shot for Ultras?

The disbandment of the Holmesdale Fanatics is a sad day for English football. It’s almost as if, in a corner of south east London, corporatisation has won over traditional support, community and heritage.

But the lessons should be heeded further afield.

It’s true that no-one wants a return to the old days of fearing for your life, racism and homophobia. And flares and smoke bombs inside stadia are just dangerous full stop, as well as illegal in the UK.

But if clubs, as they are, increasingly want to treat supporters like consumers, eventually they will behave as such. You can’t buy a ticket for a game of football now without the need some sort of membership or fan ID, meaning you can’t just decide to go to a game with someone who hasn’t got the requisite logins. Or take your kids without signing them all up and finding two or three seats together. Take your two kids to a home game and you’re looking at £200 once you factor in tickets, travel, food and drink.

Dangerous road to travel

That’s ok for a business wanting to grow and thrive but it’s also a dangerous road to travel, not for the money men or the TV broadcasters that now dominate the game, but the grassroots communities that once formed around football clubs. For young people wanting to be part of something. For fans, even the older ones, for whom their club flows through their lifeblood.

Businesses need to profit to survive and grow, but there’s a happy medium where local communities, lifelong and new supporters have affordable access and a sense of belonging.

Ultras have firmly established themselves as that vehicle; the engine room of matchday atmosphere in contemporary British football and a way for fans to band together.

By losing them you lose a lot more than an organised bunch dressed in black and banging a drum.