Darts competition at Etihad Stadium erupts into violence

Date January 11, 2015 - 11:23AM

Lily Partland

Riot police quell crowd at darts tournament

An international darts tournament at Etihad Stadium erupted into chaos on Saturday evening when crowd members began throwing plastic chairs and tables.

One eyewitness said he travelled to Melbourne from Sydney especially to attend the Darts Invitational Challenge and was shocked and disgusted at the rowdy behaviour.

"It was an absolute mess, drunken idiots that were getting bored and looking for a bit of excitement."

He said people were jumping on the tables until they broke in half and some were body slamming other crowd members.

Security guards tried and failed to defuse the situation, before dozens of riot police entered the stadium.

"It was like a proper riot mentality. The security guards couldn't get a handle on it, it was a real uphill battle for them."

The final of the tournament was temporarily delayed due to the situation.

The eyewitness said when it eventually concluded, the winner - the world number one Michael van Gerwen - seemed unimpressed.

"The look on his face after he won, it was a look not of victory, but one of pure disgust," he said.

"I've never seen anything like it. It wasn't good for the sport, it wasn't good for the city's image. I thought it was terrible."

Etihad Stadium communications manager Bill Lane said about 40 fans were ejected from the stadium after the violence erupted about 9pm and three people were treated by paramedics for minor injuries.

He said 70 security guards were on duty on Saturday night.

"The night started really well but unfortunately a small minority did behave poorly," he said.

"There'll be a major debrief and we are talking with police and our own security contractor. We won't shy away from what happened and invariably we learn something from every event."

Mr Lane said the venue had an alcohol-management plan in place and was only serving mid-strength beer.

The bar was closed down at the first sign of trouble, he said.

About 40 police were brought in to help restore order.

Crowd member Tim Berzins said there was definitely not enough security at the event.

"Etihad management certainly need to learn from that. It didn't reflect well on the general public of Australia."

Twitter users in the crowd expressed their disappointment.

http://www.theage.com.au/victoria/darts-competition-at-etihad-stadium-erupts-into-violence-20150111-12lpsj.html

Soccer violence at the Darts....

Darts > Football. Second year in a row that i've been and it's just a ridiculous amount of fun. It was utter chaos but hardly violent.

I'm so freaking keen to go to the darts.

Was actually thinking about going down there for this one! We gotta make sure we get in early for the next Sydney show. I'll bring the flares.

What was it like compared to the saturday last year? Didn't bother going last night because I didn't think anyone else was ffs

It was mental. Last year it was mostly just the football lads and the others in the know who were going nuts with everyone else following along, this year everyone started to lose their minds. They cut the beers (which were only mid strength this year) very early but it didn't matter because everyone was well and truly fucked up by then. People running along tables and getting RKO'd, beer showers every time chase the sun came on, tables flying across the room, Batman and Robin tag team wrestling a nurse and a guy in a tiger onesy and putting them through a table, "shoes off if you love the darts". #seriousscenes

The problem is if Melbourne even get to host again, they'll likely ruin it with security overkill now.

Soccer shame.

Damn

Why was no one ripping any flares?

So if it's non-soccer it's "drunken boys on a bender".

if it's soccer it's "violence and thuggery destroy world game's potential".

Geezez

Edited by wamackie: 12/1/2015 03:03:31 PM

Any footage of this? Hopefully it's MMA with Bunnings chairs.

If 40 people were ejected from a Victory game at Etihad it would be deemed a "riot".

The word riot was literally in the headlines you dumb fucks

Have seen this been called a riot all over the news, whats your point?

Also the 40 people evicted were probably all vuck fans anyway

Footage is everywhere mate. Instagram, Twitter, youtube have heaps

Celtic Dart Fans Vs Rangers Dart Fans.:lol:

Not on the news outlets I saw.
It comes across as Aussie larrikins having too much piss compared to wogs gone wild.