Riots and Death Threats, from Paris, with Love.

By: Laurie | December 10th, 2007

What do you do if your team is floundering?

If you’re Paris St. Germain fans, first you go on strike. Second, you present players and management with a list of your complaints. And third, you break into the yard of one of your top players, Jerome Rothen, slash his tires, and slip death threats under his door.

Here are the details I got via e-mail from Parisian Massaer, (writer of our Marseille Offside), who had a birds-eye view of events:

Last week at the Parc des Princes, against Caen, PSG fans decided to go on strike for the first 15 minutes. Mind you these were the fan unions from the Auteuil and Boulogne stands. They printed out their reasons to make people understand why they were doing it. And somehow one of them managed to give a flyer to Jerome Rothen. He was stretching but took the paper anyways. Now on the paper were written reasons and more importantly they were targeting some players, including Rothen who’s a Parisian just like us. He took it harder than most and threw away the paper after balling it up. [Rothen's own description of events was: "There were a lot of very harsh words against us. One hour before a match, I don't find that acceptable."]

It was shown on TV and the supporters made a whole big deal about it. The problem is Rothen went on Luis Fernandez’s show last monday to apologize and met a few fans this week at the Camp des Loges (their training ground) and talked with them. But during the remainder of the week, he received letters under his door with threats (or death threats according to a few media) and he was under police protection when he went to Auxerre and still is apparently.

Because going after a left-footed international winger capable of scoring from free kicks and delivering perfect crosses? An excellent idea. They’re a dime a dozen.

This brouhaha caused police to dispatch 300 officers in advance of Sunday’s away game against Auxerre. (Imagine what it would have required if it had been a home game.) The police were needed when PSG fans tried to break through barriers to get to the PSG team bus before the match, causing police to dispel the crowd with tear gas. One officer was injured by a flying projectile, and three people were arrested. Including one for — get this — “attacking a police dog.” I could not make this stuff up if I tried.

Fortunately for Rothen, during the game he delivered a beautiful cross directly to the head of teammate Peguy Luyindula for the game-winning goal. This means he was largely responsible for pulling PSG out of the relegation zone, at least for the moment.

Maybe that will get his name off the death threat list?