Roman Kemp describes “really, really scary” experience at the Champions League Final

This morning on his Capital Breakfast show, Roman Kemp described the “really, really scary” moment he was tear gassed as he tried to enter the Champions League Final.

Roman described the panic amongst fans, including his mate who had a panic attack, as thousands of people were funnelled through a “horrific” gap created by police. He said he witnessed police laughing at Liverpool fans, including children, and that he witnessed police pushing a fan who was there with his visually impaired father.

Addressing his listeners, Roman told them that he was seeing a lot of people on Twitter that “need their heads wobbling”, because there are many fake stories being shared about what happened, but he was actually there.

“I was lucky, I went out there with two of my mates, both my mates were supporting Liverpool, they had Liverpool shirts on, I had a Real Madrid shirt on, right, and I say that for good reason,” he said.

They’d arrived in Paris on Friday in time for Saturday’s game and looking around, he thought how easily it could “kick off” between some of the Liverpool and French fans.

He continued: “Let me say, they [Liverpool fans] were fantastic. Every bar that I went to the Liverpool fans were respectful of the owners, they weren’t spilling out onto the street. It was great.

“Honestly, they were sticking to their areas, there was no trouble, I didn’t see one fight or anything that people associate with “football hooliganism” and things like that. There was nothing, [everyone was] really, really polite.”

Roman and his friends arrived at the ground for the match at 6.15pm, with the kick off due at 9pm, expecting to be inside within half an hour.

“The second – the second – we got there, it was hostility straightaway. There were just police vans everywhere,” said Roman. “But so many police vans that what they were doing was, they only created… put it this way, you’ve got 20,000 Liverpool fans, right 20,000 of them. The only gap that they were allowing people to walk through, down a narrow alleyway, concrete wall either side, the only gap that they were allowing was, like, 70 to 90 centimetres wide. So even for one person, you had to turn to the side to get through it.”

One of his friends was having a panic attack and wanted to get out of there, so Roman did his best to calm him down and reassure him that they’d be ok.

“And then all sudden, the police on this side, they’re in their vans, and they’re just laughing,” the presenter said. Laughing at the fans. And then the police are like…now no one is kicking off… and then all of a sudden tear gas starts getting thrown at us, all of a sudden the pepper spray starts coming out from the top, right around the gates, and all those types of things. And people are panicking. I saw you know, there were boys there, young kids were in there, people trying to hold up their kids.”

He said he saw one fan, who was with his visually impaired father, allegedly being pushed by police.

Saying that he was really annoyed at people tweeting that it was Liverpool fans who were to blame, he continued: “I’m not a Liverpool fan but I’ll tell you right now, they did absolutely nothing wrong.

“And it was just so, so horrendous. It was discriminatory against Liverpool fans. And the reason I say that, right, they should investigate it, because when we got in there, all the Real Madrid fans were in there, and the Liverpool fans were not in there, at all. It was it was crazy, it was absolutely crazy.

“And then they have the cheek of it to say “oh the game’s kicked off [late] because of the late arrival of fans”. It wasn’t! They wouldn’t let you in! It was really, really scary.

Roman described it as the worst experience he’s ever had in a football ground.

Capital Breakfast with Roman Kemp airs weekdays from 6am – 10am on Capital and Global Player.