Idiotic fans north and south of the border are taken to task.

Here at DangerHere Towers we're a fairly easygoing bunch. We like to go about our business in an unobtrusive way, not bothering anyone and not expecting anyone to bother us. However, there are times when people do get on our wick. Like Vinnie Jones, for instance, as you may have read in last week's column. It's at times like this that the darker side of DangerHere comes out, the side that we usually like to keep hidden, mainly for legal purposes. This is the side that places those who displease us in very real danger of suffering terrible retribution, possibly of the lowered head-first into a pool of hungry piranha variety. Yes, it takes a lot to rile us, but once you do, you better watch out.

The recent treatment of Neil Lennon at Windsor Park during Northern Ireland's trouncing at the hands of mighty Norway set us thinking about other instances of moronic behaviour on Irish football terraces. Not crowd violence - stuff more low-key than that. Behaviour of the kind of crass stupidity that is on display whenever a sizeable section of the general public gets together.

Neil Lennon was booed by, it is claimed, a small section of the Windsor Park crowd. It was encouraging, at least from the point of view of a fairly ill-informed Southerner, that other members of the crowd tried to drown out these catcalls with cheering. Lennon's only crime was that he signed for Glasgow Celtic. In the minds of a few morons, this is obviously anathema, although it's a safe bet that if you pressed them about exactly why this is so, they wouldn't be able to respond with anything more coherent than some meaningless emotive sloganeering. What difference does it make whether you play for Celic? Does any Celtic fan imagine that Henrik Larsson would have thought twice about accepting a big-money deal to go to Ibrox prior to his move to Celtic Park? Anyone who does is stupid in the extreme. Celtic hero Larsson is a football player and nothing more. He stands for nothing except playing football for a living. Neil Lennon's move to Celtic was nothing more than a transfer to a new club. How could it be construed an being in any way political when Lennon is happy to play for Northern Ireland? Hardly the act of a rabid Republican, is it? Anyway, enough about that.

Remember when Roy Keane was booed while playing for Ireland, simply because a certain sports journalist had got it into his head that Keane wasn't making enough of an effort while wearing the green? Let's not get into the argument about whether Keano gives his all for his country. That's beside the point. The real issue is how this journalist managed to convince himself that he had a moral right - or any other kind of right, for that matter - to encourage the public to jeer one of his country's foremost representatives. The worst of it was that some people actually did what he said. As a result, we were treated to the ugly spectacle of one of our own being booed whenever he was on the ball. It was cold comfort that others in the crowd tried to drown out this shameful jeering with chants of "Keano, Keano". That day, we were a nation undeserving of success.

Then there was the sickening moment more recently when Ireland met Yugoslavia in Lansdowne Road during the Kosovo crisis. When the band struck up the Yugoslav national anthem, certain elements in the crowd saw fit to begin a round of jeering and catcalls. These, we don't doubt, were the very individuals least informed about what was happening in the Balkans at the time. Do they imagine that the entire Serbian and Montenegran nations to the last individual, including all the Yugoslav soccer team, were responsible for the atrocities? Do they believe that Ireland is in some way morally superior to Yugoslavia, that there are not just as many people in this country capable of savage crimes against humanity? The only difference between us and them is that we are in the more fortunate position of being in a situation as a nation where the worst scumbags are usually kept in check. At least some of the more civilised Irish fans went out of their way to applaud the anthem generously when it was finished, showing that most people still understand the concept of showing respect for other nations.

DangerHere has the good fortune to be able to attend the Ireland v. Italy match in Giants Stadium in 1994. While by and large that was a great occasion, with a great atmosphere, and a great result for Ireland, it was marred by the behaviour of certain Irish fans. For example, there was the couple of idiots sitting directly behind DangerHere who took it upon themselves to be a kind of proxy Giles and Dunphy, supplying football analysis on tap, though never with the remotest degree of perception. For example, about five minutes into the match, before anything much had really happened, they were saying things like: "Ireland aren't playing well. That right channel just isn't working for them." Suffice to say, it was very irritating. Then there were the drunken Irish oafs in neighbouring seats who saw fit to insult and cackle mirthlessly at the very polite Italian fans sitting in front of them. That was the face of Irish fandom not reported in the euphoria of the time. "Sure, aren't we the greatest fans in the world?" Get stuffed.