Football: French government acts over crowd violence

FRANCE'S Interior Minister, Charles Pasqua, appointed a football security officer yesterday to combat escalating violence after 10 policemen were injured by Paris-St-Germain fans during a match at the Parc des Princes on Saturday.

The new post, Pasqua said, had been created 'to conduct, in co-operation with the French football federation, big clubs and other countries already confronted by such violent acts, a new approach to football security'.

Ten policemen were injured trying to break up fighting among fans at the match between Paris-St-Germain and Caen. Three of the officers were hospitalised, including one who was still in intensive care last night.

Paris fans have been involved in several incidents and last May, after rioting at Marseille, the club stopped organising travel for them and refused to sell tickets to known troublemakers.

The fighting on Saturday interrupted the game for 20 minutes. The Paris club went on to win 2-0 with goals by Daniel Bravo and David Ginola. A goalless draw away to St-Etienne was not quite enough to put Bordeaux on top of the the French league while Nantes also drew 0-0 despite dominating their visitors, Montpellier.

Ajax continue to head the Dutch league, on goal difference ahead of Roda JC Kerkrade, with a 1-0 win away to Vitesse Arnhem, Jari Litmanen scoring. Roda beat Go Ahead Eagles Deventer 2-1 while PSV Eindhoven, a point behind, beat Willem II Tilburg by the same score. Feyenoord have two games in hand on Ajax and have yet to concede a goal.

In Germany, Eintracht Frankfurt kept up their pressure on leaders, Werder Bremen, with a 5-1 win against Nuremberg, the Ghanaian Anthony Yeboah scoring twice to make him the country's leading scorer with five goals. The champions Bremen also won, by 3-2 at Kaiserslautern.

The Polish coach, Andrzej Strejlau, included only five players from the domestic league in his squad of 16 announced yesterday for the World Cup qualifier against England at Wembley on September 8. He also included 11 of the 13 who played in the 1-1 draw between the two sides in Poland in May.

POLISH SQUAD (for Group Two World Cup qualifier v England, Wembley, September 8): Malysek (Cologne), Bako (Lech Poznan), Szewczyk (Sochaux), Swierczynski (St-Etienne), Lesiak (Wacker Innsbruck), Kozminski (Udinese), Waldoch (Gornik Zabrze), Wegrzyn (GKS Katowice), Czachowski (Legia Warsaw), Adamczuk (Dundee), Warzycha (Everton), Ziober (Montpellier), Brzeczek (Gornik Zabrze), Kosecki (Atletico Madrid), Lesniak (Wattenscheid), Furtok (Eintracht Frankfurt).