Jakarta Casual

Of course not all Indonesian football fans are thugs. The vast majority are decent folk who just wanna support their team without being teargassed by police, get caught up in a brawl or have ambitious politicians use them for their own nefarious purposes.

Couple of weeks back I saw PSS fans putting on a far better show than their team did against Persipasi. The seven coachloads who had made the long journey from home got behind their team from the get go and stayed their all the way through.

When things got a bit lairy on the field after the final whistle there was no more than two or three fans forcing back the more excitable members of the travelling contingent who wanted to get down on the field for some post game dancing with the ref or security services.

That same supporters group, Brigata Curva Sud, recently held a charity night to raise funds for three PSS fans who had been victims of incidents previously, sorry not fully clear what incidents.

The fans auctioned player's shirts and other memorabilia and raised almost 24 million rupiah, over $2,500, for the victims families.