Nigels lose their ultras

Before Palace’s opening home game of the season with Manchester City, the Holmesdale Front released a statement announcing they were “choosing to stop all organised activity as the HF inside the stadium” and cited “never-ending problems with the club up to the present day” among various reasons for the decision.

One of their concerns, relayed in a statement before February’s Conference League first knockout round home leg against Zrinjski Mostar, is a perception that the “club is determined to keep trying to force an American-style ‘experience’ on us”.

Chairman Steve Parish says it is “disappointing” to lose the group from Selhurst but believes there is nothing more Palace could have done, and cites safety and regulatory requirements.

“We’ve embraced them from the day I arrived here, and we’ve used them in our marketing,” he told The New York Times. “I don’t really know what’s at the heart of it. I understand that it’s difficult and frustrating at times — look at Lech Poznan, when they let off all those fireworks (in the opening Europa League match of this season at Selhurst).

“It’s hard because of the rules and regulations we have and the safety group. I understand it (and) we’re a very heavily-regulated society, so it’s frustrating for them sometimes. I don’t think that we could facilitate them any more than we do whilst trying to keep them safe and trying to get within the regulations.”

“I don’t really deal with them. They’re ultras, that’s not really how they roll. They have a dialogue with the people at the club on an ongoing basis. I understand how they feel. There are people that are around football who don’t want that kind of support at football grounds.

“I’ve personally had big battles on their behalf. I’ve been told by ‘the authorities’ on multiple occasions that we should ban the whole group. There’s an element where football fans are pushing back on it, where they want to have a bit more freedom to express themselves, but everything’s banned in England. It’s a fair frustration.”

There has been criticism of what some perceive to be a more ‘manufactured’ atmosphere pre-game and after Palace goals which the HF appear to believe stifles the organic approach they have tried to facilitate. Parish, though, says the choice is not binary.

“You have to be realistic,” he says. “We are a global show. We are putting on a show, and not everybody wants the same things all the time. There’s room for both of those things, but I don’t know a stadium up and down the country that doesn’t do any of the things that we do, and they work really well.

“There is a bit of a frustration sometimes from the fan base that they all have to do what (the HF) want all the time. ‘We have to sing their songs and do what they want, when they want’. Families come and sit in other parts of the stand and stadium and they want to hear some good music. Fans can’t sing the whole time in the lead-up to a game. You can always find a good compromise, and I think we will. Something will come back, and we’ll make it work.

“We loved everything they did. We were hugely supportive, and in the face of some quite vehement opposition. They’ve been an important part of what we’ve done. Anybody that wants to do something similar, we’re trying to accommodate it as much as we can, but not everything stays the same all the time."