The day copies of Red Issue were seized by GMP
Patrice Evra (red shirt) reacts after Luis Suarez (second left, black top) refuses to shake his hand before Liverpool's Premier League encounter with Manchester United in February 2012
- Published
On Thursday, we are giving you extracts of Simon Stone's interview with former Red Issue editor John-Paul O'Neill.
Possibly the most memorable moment in Red Issue's history came in February 2012, when Greater Manchester Police seized 1,600 copies of the fanzine being sold outside Old Trafford before Manchester United's game against Liverpool.
GMP officers were concerned a spoof Ku Klux Klan hood along with the words 'LFC' and 'Suarez is Innocent' on the cover would fuel tensions between fans given the eight-match suspension the Liverpool forward Luis Suarez had received for racially abusing United defender Patrice Evra.
GMP eventually decided to take no action and before the game, Suarez refused to shake Evra's hand, drawing fierce condemnation from Sir Alex Ferguson.
"Even though it was a joke about Suarez being involved in a racist incident and we were the ones lampooning him, we were the ones getting accused of racism," says John-Paul O'Neill.
"It was just ludicrous. They prepared a big case. They went to those lengths over a satirical joke in 2012. It's like, 'wow'."
Red Issue closed as a fanzine in 2015 and O'Neill is not sure it could exist now.
"We'd have a lot fewer readers that's for sure," he said.
"We had Mick Hulme's column. He was always raging against the criminalisation of fans for singing what are known as hate songs or tragedy chanting. I don't like them, but should it be a criminal offence?
"The game has been sanitised. They want all that rivalry and bitterness, but a nice clean version of it. Is it possible to have the two? Why would you want the two?
"Whenever there's a punch up, commentators say it is a disgrace and no-one wants to see it. Everybody wants to see that."