English blamed for violence

Riot police keep the fans from the pitch

Aberdeen chief executive Keith Wyness has blamed rising violence at English football grounds for the crowd trouble that struck his club's match against Rangers on Saturday.

And BBC Scotland has been told by reliable football sources that there were English fans within the Rangers section of the crowd.

Now the Scottish Executive is set to become involved in investigating the violence that led to a lengthy delay of the match at Pittodrie Stadium.

This kind of behaviour is unacceptable in any context and we hope this is an isolated occurrence

Mike Watson
Scottish sports minister

There has been a long history of trouble between Aberdeen and Rangers on and off the field, dating back to the early 1980s.

But Wyness believes that the flames were stoked by recent trouble in England.

The Scottish Premier League match had to be delayed for 20 minutes after Aberdeen player Robbie Winters was struck with a coin, provoking violence between rival sets of fans.

This latest incident came two weeks after televised violence at the Cardiff City-Leeds United FA Cup match.

Wyness said: "It is something that we have been seeing on TV from England and that's probably sparked off a lot of these things again.

"The things thrown by the Rangers fans were disappointing and sparked off some disappointing scenes."

Robbie Winters is struck by a coin

But Wyness insisted: "Let's not blow it out of proportion after one incident."

Until this incident, Scottish football had been relatively free of crowd trouble in comparison to neighbouring England.

Wyness suggested that the media - some newspapers ran articles about the "catalogue of hatred" between the clubs on the morning of the game - had also to take a share of the blame.

Scottish Premier League chief executive Roger Mitchell had earlier stressed that his organisation would join with Grampian Police in an investigation on Monday.

Inspector Craig Menzies pointed out that matches between the clubs were "an historically difficult fixture", and insisted that a large amount of planning had gone into policing the event.

Fans spill on to the Pittodrie pitch

There was one arrest inside the ground and 13 prior to the match. Nine people received minor injuries during the disturbance.

"The assistant chief constable has said a full inquiry into the events has been instigated and a senior investigating officer has been appointed," said Menzies.

"We will look at all the evidence available, including CCTV and television images, and anything else we can get to help us identify any misconduct."

Scottish sports minister Mike Watson said: "This kind of behaviour is unacceptable in any context and we hope this is an isolated occurrence.

"We will be discussing it further with both police and the football authorities."