Rangers and the Famous ICF: My Life With Scotland's Most-Feared Football Hooligan Gang (28 page)

But he told us it was all legal and above board, thanks to the new law. He also said that we would be taken to a primary-school gym on the outskirts of Bordeaux, where we would be fed and then allowed to watch the game. After that a decision would be taken on what was to happen to us.

Our ball was now well and truly burst. Six months of planning and anticipation had been swept down the drain. Nor did we believe their assurances about watching the game or about a decision being taken on what to do with us after it. That was just to placate us and make us more manageable. We knew that in France you could be held without charge for days and we thought that’s what was going to happen.

The riot police, the CRS – real naughty cunts with their batons, helmets and armour – herded us onto a bus. We were then given an escort that would have done Al Qaeda proud: six motorcyclists plus a vanload of riot police. The convoy swept through the centre of Bordeaux, taking us alongside the stadium where we passed the Tartan Army, some of whom booed while others clapped us. A few of the lads dropped their trousers
and bared their arses as an insult, showing them that we hadn’t forgotten what happened in Gothenburg.

We reached the outskirts of the city and drew up outside the primary school, just as we had been told. The place was teeming with riot cops and as we got off the bus we got that sinking feeling. We weren’t going to get food and we weren’t going to be watching the game either. Based on what had happened to the ICF in Marseille earlier in the 1990s they would probably single out a few boys and give them a hiding, probably on the pretext that we had started the trouble. Inside the school we were ushered past dozens more riot goons, which made us even more convinced we were going to be attacked.

In the gym we all moved to the centre of the floor, psyching ourselves up for the onslaught we felt sure would follow. I was in a foul mood, having had a blazing row with one of our boys, Gary the Gimp, over a fag. As the minutes passed we got tenser and tenser, expecting the doors of the gym to open and a squad of Robocops to burst in. Then we heard footsteps and as they got closer we prepared to defend ourselves. When the door did swing open the cops made an entrance, but they were carrying trays wrapped in foil. It was chicken (or more likely rabbit) dinners! We were all fucking starving and the food cheered us up no end, as did the sight of a massive television being wheeled in for us to watch the game. The cops had been telling the truth after all. Scotland drew 1–1 with Norway, which meant there was still a chance we could qualify for the second stage if we managed to beat Morocco in the third and final group game. Some of us even thought of staying on for that game, which would have given us a great opportunity to fight Moroccan immigrants.

But first we had to find out what plans the riot police had for us. An hour after the game had ended we were still stuck in the gym and our patience was running thin. We asked what the script was and were told that we could be held for twenty-four hours. The cops had a problem. Because of some legal technicality they could only deport us back to our country of origin, which of course was Spain. And that’s what they did. We were put back on the bus, which would take us back to Salou. That at least was some consolation. We could now enjoy what was left of our holiday and soak up the Spanish sunshine.

As I took my seat on the bus I got the first indication of the media storm that was to follow. Through a crack in the window I could see a photographer taking shots with a long lens. ‘I hope to fuck that’s just the French papers,’ I said to the boy next to me.

For the journey back to Salou we had an escort worthy of a visiting head of state. There were several police cars, riot vans, motorcyclists and even a helicopter. Talk about overkill. The Scottish media had also parked their tanks on our lawns. Our little expedition was the top story on the BBC and STV news and it was plastered on the front page of almost every Scottish newspaper. We thought that the English lads would attract the attention of the media, given the huge numbers involved, but not us. Our mob was minuscule by comparison. But by now the writing was well and truly on the wall.

Back in Salou at our hotel we got a phone call from a
Daily Record
reporter, which I took. I told him that I had no comment to make and I refused to confirm who else was there. He then reeled off the names of people he believed were in our group, including mine. That was a shock to me as I thought the reporter didn’t know I was there. ‘I don’t know what you are talking about,’ I curtly replied, and put down the receiver.

The next day I phoned Mum to tell her that I might be named in the
Daily Record
. But the paper had beaten me to it. ‘I’ve already had them at the door and they tricked me into giving them a photograph of you. But I didn’t tell them anything that could hurt you,’ she told me. I did my best to reassure Mum, trying to convince her that everything would be all right. I didn’t do that great a job; in fact I didn’t even convince myself. I knew the papers would have a field day at my expense.

The irony was that I had been making a real effort to turn my life around. I had met Kerry, the woman who was to become my wife, and I was doing an HND in sports coaching at college, where I had been at the top of my class. I realised however that I was kidding myself. Football violence was still the driving force in my life, to the detriment of everything else.

Sure enough, when I got a hold of a copy of the
Record
I was cast as the villain of the piece. ‘Chugg is the leader of the 58-strong group who were detained in Salou,’ it told its readers. And it wasn’t just the
Daily Record
. I was named as the SNF leader or ringleader by every Scottish media organisation from the BBC to
The Sun
. I also now discovered that our detention in Bordeaux had been given blanket coverage, something we had been blissfully unaware of at the time.

Reporters had even approached the college, and my employers, Clyde Football Club, to get their reaction, and while both had said I was highly thought of it must have been embarrassing for them. I knew there was a possibility that I might be kicked out of college and sacked from my job.
More importantly, Mum and Kerry were upset. I felt sorry for them but I wasn’t ashamed of what I had done. After all I had only gone to France to fight like-minded individuals, not scarfers or ordinary French people. In fact as the calls poured in from journalists in a strange way I almost felt proud. FV was what we were all about; it was what we lived for and to be recognised for that was very satisfying, if you follow my logic.

It was at this point we discovered the extent of the police operation. We got the night porter at our hotel drunk and he told us that two under-cover cops had posed as hotel workers to keep an eye on us. It was little wonder they had been so clued up about the coach trip to Bordeaux. But the authorities had known all about us from day one at Glasgow airport, despite our best efforts to keep things quiet. We were convinced that someone had grassed us up. Our main suspect was Andy Blance, leader of those Hibs boys who had decided to stay with the CCS after Fat McLeod had broken ranks and formed the national firm. To tease the media we put a £5,000 ‘contract’ on Blance’s head. It was shite of course but it kept the pot boiling and it gave us a few laughs when we saw how seriously the papers took it.

We didn’t go the Morocco game and instead flew home from Reus on the Saturday. Our expectation was of a huge media stushie at Glasgow airport and a scramble to get photos of us for the Sunday papers and news bulletins. We were right on the money. The place was awash with journalists, most of them looking out for ‘SNF ringleader’ Sandy Chugg. Customs and Excise, however, did me a big favour. ‘Right, Mr Chugg, come with me,’ I was instructed. They had targeted me because I had a conviction for selling drugs and they hauled me into an office and conducted a full body search. They probably did it to annoy me but in fact they saved me from the abuse the rest of the boys were getting from pressmen and the general public in the main concourse. The place was thronged with tourists waiting to fly out on their annual holiday and when they spotted the SNF with their ‘three-lions’ England T-shirts they didn’t hold back. Our lads were roundly abused and called ‘scum’ and ‘a disgrace to Scotland’. Inevitably, fights broke out between the SNF and the holidaymakers, which the police did their best to contain.

By the time I was released by Customs several more flights had disembarked and when I was walking out I was part of a huge crowd and therefore hard for the few remaining pressmen to spot. My stepdad had come to meet me and he told me to put on my hat and sunglasses and that also helped. I am convinced that many of the reporters were expecting
me to be six-foot two and built like an all-in wrestler. They wouldn’t have been looking for a guy at five-nine with a slight build. The result was that they didn’t get a photo of the SNF bogeyman, because I was bundled into a car and driven off.

Avoiding the press at the airport was a minor victory because I knew from that day on I would be a marked man: not only for the media but also for the police. Despite me having given up active involvement in football violence, I am still a target. Thanks to Salou I have endured thirteen years of grief.

Some of the boys were kind enough to provide me with their memories of life with the ICF. Towards the end of the chapter I have also included a couple of stories from the youth wing of the mob; after all, they are the future.

Here is a selection.

It might upset some of our boys but the famous Rangers ICF was inspired not by a Rangers fan but by an Aberdeen fan, or casual.

It was 1983. I was fifteen and I remember that a boy at our school supported the Dons. As part of a group of what would later become known as casuals he followed them home and away. Every Monday morning he would come into the playground wearing big thick trainers, split jeans and a Peter Storm cagoule and regale us with tales of taking a mob to Edinburgh and Dundee, and how it would go off big time with the locals.

Fashion and fighting. A fifteen-year-old’s dream.

We wanted some of that. In Glasgow we were in a bit of a void in fashion terms. Most of us were just getting out of Sta Press and two-tone.

A small group of us from school had been going to Ibrox for a few years and sitting in the Broomloan stand, where the away fans were housed. In those pre-Souness days Rangers didn’t have such a big following and so you got to know the guys around you pretty quickly. At that stage there was no organised football violence as such.

Anyway, this day my school pal ‘Aberdeen P’ told us the Aberdeen casuals were going to be in town (on their way to Paisley for a game with St Mirren) and a dozen of us went in for a look. We clocked them at Queen Street station. They were thirty-strong, all of them aged from about fifteen to twenty-two. They were wearing brightly coloured clothes and they all had serious haircuts, with a
few even sporting moustaches. Looking back there was a huge difference between us. Most of them were adults and we were just kids. Aberdeen P introduced us to them and after a closer look at their clobber, some chat and a bit of Glasgow lip a few blows were thrown. We lost but we didn’t run; we stood our ground and had another go . . . and lost again.

At this stage a few of the older Aberdeen mob got bored and went to the pub. We licked our wounds and headed for Enterprise, an amusement arcade, where we met up with some other young Rangers fans from the north side of Glasgow. Looking for reinforcements to take on Aberdeen we told them about the incident and when they heard about what had happened they were right up for it. So it was a bigger, altogether more confident group that marched the three hundred yards back to Queen Street, where we had it with the younger Aberdeen lads. We did well initially, belting quite a few of them, but they bolted to the Pig and Whistle pub where they called out their big guns.

Although we got another going over when their older lads re-engaged we were hooked. That night four or five of us decided that we wanted to become casuals, although some of the boys who had been in Queen Street decided against it, simply because they didn’t fancy a bent nose every weekend. Those who were up for it spent the next few months saving our spare dosh from the milk round and investing it in footwear like Adidas New Yorkers, Puma G Vilas and Adidas Wimbledon. We also dressed ourselves in Lacoste T-shirts, flared jumbo cords and some decidedly dodgy Paisley-pattern granddad shirts. It was hard to find the right gear, Glasgow not exactly being awash with this type of attire at the time.

Before we knew it we had twenty guys from our area who knew each other well and who would back each other up, whether they were in the right or the wrong. On our first few forays to Rangers games as casuals we were met with open hostility from some of our own scarfers. But we brassed it out and didn’t shy away from the inevitable confrontations. Most of the older Rangers fans realised that we were bluenoses too, just like them, and eventually the aggro calmed down.

The boys who sat alongside us in the Broomloan also started to dress casually and the whole thing just spread from there. We regularly got thrown out of the ground for misbehaviour and sometimes we struggled to get into the away end at Ibrox, even though few teams brought much of a support. It went on like that for the rest of the season and for most of the following season too. Being arrested was also becoming much more prevalent.

In terms of our name we called ourselves the Inter City Firm from day one. The reasoning was that we would get more credibility by copying the name of a real mob. Simple as. Then, in 1985, some of the guys suggested that we move into seats in Section Red of the Govan stand. It made sense. Section Red was the
nearest area in the stadium to the away support and it gave us a good visible mob for both the visitors and the television cameras. We adopted the name Section Red for the mob and it really caught on, but, later that season we moved again to the terraced enclosure and the Section Red moniker faded into history. A few of the boys suggested an alternative name of Her Majesty’s Service but it never took off. ICF just seemed to stick but although we were ICF in name we rarely used British Rail’s expensive commodity, the Inter City train, and stuck to the old football specials due to the financial constraints of the Eighties.