City Reputation On The Line At Old Trafford

This Sunday's Manchester Derby also marks a tragic anniversary. How will it play out?

Kevin Parker, president of the Manchester City Supporters Club, has written to United, urging them to mark the commemoration with a minute’s applause instead of silence.

By Citizen Correspondent Jon Fleming

Date Posted: 02/07/08

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Are Manchester City fans being scapegoated by the media in the wake of the Munich anniversary? This Sunday, Manchester City and Manchester United will meet in the 149th Manchester Derby, three days after the 50th anniversary of the Munich Disaster, when eight of Manchester United’s players died when their plane crashed on the runway at Munich airport. Before the kick-off, United will impose a minute of silence in memory of the dead.

As the week leading up to this derby runs out, the amount of speculation and anxiety over whether the silence will be properly observed is growing, and the respective martyr/lout archetypes of United and City propagated in the language of most media. Words like “idiots”, “thugs”, and “mindless morons” are being used to effectively tar City fans in advance.

City supporters tend to view United as pompous, arrogant, and hypocritical. United, from a City perspective, are the rich kid bullies of the Premiership League. City, on the other hand, are looked down by their powerful rivals as being poor, losers, and under-achievers.

United’s website described City’s victory in August at the last derby as a “smash and grab”, likening the team to thieves robbing a shop window. A banner at United’s Old Trafford stadium, where Sunday’s match will take place, mocks City’s “lack of silverware”, or modest success in recent decades. Every year that City fails to win the league or FA Cup, the number on the banner goes up. Of course this breeds resentment, and resentment breeds trouble.

Already the similarly planned minute’s of silence at the international match between England and Switzerland on Wednesday was “spoiled” by “raised voiced from the Wembley (Stadium) crowd.” The referee, fearing that the situation could only get worse, blew his whistle, cutting the minute of silence down to about thirty seconds. Many see the disruption at Wembley as a kind of preview of what will happen at Old Trafford on Sunday, except, should it happen there, severe repercussions could ensue, perhaps even a riot.

Some of the concern about City’s conduct is coming from within. Kevin Parker, president of the Manchester City Supporters Club, has written to United, urging them to mark the commemoration with a minute’s applause instead of silence.