After Champions League ‘fiasco’, UEFA probes what went wrong

DUBAI: The French government is blaming Liverpool fans. The English club are enraged by the “irresponsible, unprofessional” rush to conclusions. European soccer’s governing body, UEFA, will now try to uncover what went wrong in the disorder and chaos in Paris at the Champions League final before Liverpool lost to Real Madrid.

UEFA is starting to gather evidence about issues outside the Stade de France that marred one of the world’s biggest games in sports on Saturday. Liverpool fans’ leadership groups are already complaining about heavy-handed policing and poor organization on a troubling night that saw children and elderly people among those getting sprayed by tear gas. Richard Bouigue, deputy mayor of the 12th arrondissement in Paris, said “the time for official denial is over, the time for apologies must be imposed” in a letter to a Liverpool supporters’ group.

“I deplore the dysfunctions in the organization of the game and the lack of maintenance of order that led to this real fiasco,” Bouigue wrote to the Spirit of Shankly group in a letter seen by AP. There were also renewed concerns in Spain on Wednesday about the organizational failings. “It was a pretty big mess,” said Madrid defender Dani Carvajal, whose family encountered safety issues.

“They have to learn and fix the mistakes for the next events that may happen at this stadium and hopefully everything will be better. But yes, in the end there were people who suffered a lot.” These are the key issues the UEFA review will need to take into consideration: ORGANIZATION The challenges of staging the final with just three months’ notice — Paris was awarded the game in February after a decision was taken to strip Russia’s St. Petersburg of hosting rights — has been