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When 'riot police came and pepper sprayed everybody' at Leicester

(Photo by David Rogers/Getty Images)

The infamous occasion when Leicester lost the 2007 Heineken European Cup final to Wasps at Twickenham and the riot police turned up later that night at Welford Road has been recalled by Simon Cohen, the club’s former CEO and long-serving administrator. 

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After 15 years working at Leicester in a variety of roles, Cohen was forced out in 2020 and spent two years on gardening leave. With the issue of his departure now resolved, he has reflected on his time at the Gallagher Premiership club in an interview on The Big Jim Show, hosted by ex-Scotland and Tigers second row Jim Hamilton.   

The 47-minute conversation covered a wealth of stories from his time in the professional game and a look ahead to how it might develop in the next few years as it attempts to move on from the financially damaging pandemic era.  

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Cohen had worked as a solicitor before linking up with Leicester in 2005 and it was when Hamilton mentioned lawyers when speaking about the 2020 exit of Geordan Murphy that the former Welford Road boardroom administrator referenced 2007, the year when the club was denied a treble when beaten by Wasps in the European decider in London. 

Back in Leicester later that evening, things took a turn for the worse and it ended with numerous Leicester players spending the night in police custody. Here is how the chat unfolded between Cohen and Hamilton: 

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Simon Cohen: Lawyers are generally quite boring. I mean, I remember that big night in 2007 where some people, maybe including you Jim, were…

Jim Hamilton: You can say it’s me.  

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SC: …were in the kitchen fighting…

JH: That’s defamation because I wasn’t in the kitchen. It was Henry Tuilagi and Seru Rabini.

SC: …where somebody called the police, where one policeman turned up, looked at it and went ‘oh shit’ and called the riot police. The riot police came and pepper sprayed everybody. Some of the lads spend the night in the nick.

JH: Guilty. 

SC: I’d gone to bed early. 

JH: How do you deal with that? When people listen to that they think it’s a made-up story. I’ve spoken about it so people think, ‘Well it is made up then’. But that is a true story, that was 2007 when we lost to Wasps in Europe. 

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SC: We were on a treble because we had beaten Ospresy in the Anglo-Welsh, beaten Gloucester (in the Premiership) and then in the final leg of the treble, lost to Wasps in the European final. So we had come back to Welford Road and it was a really weird atmosphere because you should have been celebrating a double, a fantastic season going to three finals winning two of them. But actually, on the day, we had been beaten in the biggest final of them all arguably, the European final, so it was a bit of a malevolent mood. You knew something was going to go wrong that night and it’s a pretty volatile mix and so it proved.

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Bull Shark 18 minutes ago
England and their Chief problem

It’s full of hogs, homophobes, redneck asshats and appears to be governed by Trump’s Taliban.

An absurd statement! Outrageous! The people of Missouri must surely revolt!


All he has to do is hustle over to Arrowhead Stadium in Kansas City, sit down over a cold Michelob with the Chiefs’ Head Coach, Andy Reid, and ask him one question: namely, how does his team manage to haul their butts out of the bonfire every other week when the flames are licking around their pants?

To be fair, Steve could achieve the same thing if he hustled down to his local bowls club. Or his local school cricket team. I don't think he needs to go so far out of town to get advice - because he's getting the basics wrong!


Are we comparing like with like here? In fairness, we’re probably not. The Chiefs are the back-to-back Superbowl champions and boast a roster of players and coaches who can all finish each other’s sentences.

This rugby website must please stop feeding our trough with NFL stuff. It makes me nauseaous.


The chiefs can go smoke a bong for all I care. All Borthwick needs to do (without code hopping) would be to look at the Boks who are filled with players and coaches who can finish each others sentences. Oh, and all he'd really need to do to get some useful insights would be to talk to Felix Jones - you know, who was actually part of the bok team.


‘We don’t have any contact with Felix,’ he said. ‘I’m not sure if the coaches do or not.’ Let’s be very polite here: this is something of a head-scratcher.


Bloody ridiculous...


Which, in turn, begs the question why haven’t England been a yard in front in their last two games? Because, defensively right now, they’re a jumble.


Getting warmer....


We know not why, although, supposedly, he’s still working for the team ‘remotely’. If you know what this means or how it works, I’m all ears. Certainly, England have no idea.

We know why. Felix said the environment was sh1t. Looks at Borthwick.


The bottom line is this:


- The management of this team is broken;

- You can't be great if your team culture and management is broken (The basics);

- Borthwick is the chief architect of this;

- Just as they looked to get their defence right during the 6 Nations - Felix is out the picture;

- They are at sqaure one - and their defence last week was hopeless. Not fixable in a week;

- The English looked unfit - and that can't be fixed in a week either.


The problems and the solution are so obvious. But anyway - let's wait until after the 6 Nations to fix the problem. England is in a slow burn - and after England ships 10 - 44 points against the Boks on Saturday I expect the sh1t will truly hit the fan.


Reckon England Rugby Team will get debated in parliament even.


Sir Clive is definitely going to poo his pants.


The Springboks are going in to this game preparing as if they are playing in a World Cup Semi-Final. England are toast.


I'll even predict that England will take an early lead. Score two tries, quick out the gates. Cunningham-Smith will be going bonkers. Downing a beer in the stands with the fans.


60 minutes later... Toast.

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