BRATISLAVA, January 5, (WEBNOVINY) — On Wednesday evening, Bratislava-Nove Mesto Mayor Rudolf Kusy, based on the request of the police, called off the Fortuna Vikend Sampionov (Weekend of Champions) football tournament, which was to take place in Bratislava on Sunday, January 8.
“We are much disappointed about the decision of the mayor and of the police. This tournament could have been a great opportunity for Slovak football and for Bratislava to organize a high quality international event,” said Arndt Jaworski, head of the championship organizer UFA Sports Slovakia at Thursday’s press conference. Jaworski said that they had the news on canceling the event from the media and have immediately initiated further negotiations, yet the city district refused their proposals.
First league football clubs from Slovakia and the Czech Republic, Slovnaft Bratislava, MSK Zilina, Spartak Trnava, Sparta Praha, Slavia Praha and Bohemians 1905 were supposed to participate at the traditional winter indoor football tournament at the Ondrej Nepela Ice Hockey Stadium’s Slovnaft Arena in Bratislava. “My absolute priority is protection of health and of people’s property. Based on my personal experience with organizing the ice hockey championship matches, I’m convinced that the football tournament’s organizers either underestimated or ignored the comments they were given in order to provide a smooth course of the event,” explained Mayor Rudolf Kusy, adding that in spite of repeated urgent requests, the organizers failed to fulfill legal preconditions for organizing such event. In it’s request [to abolish the event] the police also underlined serious safety risks connected with its organization: immediate violations of public order as well as threat of damage to life and health of the participants and of Bratislava citizens.
Bratislava County Police Chief Csaba Farago said that the organizers did not provide sufficient numbers of organizing and security staff; on the other hand, UFA Sports Slovakia’s Boris Simonic claimed the problem is the stadium which does not fulfill safety standards. According to the police, some 1,200 hard-line hooligans Spartak Trnava fans, who use extremist symbols – a phrase used to describe Neonazis – and are aggressive, were expected. A similar number of similarly-minded Slovan Bratislava fans was expected and a conflict between both groups could not be ruled out either.
According to Jaworski, the tournament took place in Prague five times with less security staff and more fans participating. “We think this decision was issued based upon a minority group of fans as most of them are decent people. It’s a big disappointment for us and our partners,” he concluded, claiming that they did their best to cooperate with the police and to fulfill their requests.
SITA