FOOTBALL never fails to amaze with its capacity to kick itself in the teeth.

Just as memories of English fans' worst hooliganism outrage are stirred by tonight's Champions League meeting between Liverpool and Juventus, the game's sullied reputation is further blackened by the punch-up between Newcastle team-mates Lee Bowyer and Kieron Dyer.

That these two highly-paid England internationals were locked in a snarling, fists-whirring scrap but for a few bewildering seconds does not detract from the longer-term impact it will have on the public's perception of football, especially at its highest domestic level.

At the post-match press conference the face of Newcastle manager Graeme Souness, himself a player of as much steel as guile, said it all. His crestfallen countenance matched that of those Newcastle fans who, at the final whistle, gaped incredulously after witnessing two of the wearers of the famous black and white striped shirts descending into the gutter-shame of a brawl.

As Souness said later the fans make sacrifices to get the not inconsiderable cash together to watch such hollow heroes as Bowyer and Dyer. And never mind the assertion that Dyer did not swing a punch, it was he who ignored the ball to turn and confront the howling, scowling Bowyer when he should have been better concentrating on doing what he is paid so lavishly to do - play football.

Both players are a disgrace to their shirt, their team-mates, their club, their fans, and their game. That they will incur heavy financial penalties and miss crucial games, including the semi-final FA Cup clash against Manchester United, should not be in question.

They deserve all they get and more, though football's expedient morality in regard to virtually any excess will ensure they are not sent packing as they would have been in any other industry. Football's elite is littered with exasperating examples of so-called stars getting away with it and unless someone has the guts to take a stand all those pampered prima-donnas who transgress will continue to think they are above the letter of the law, let alone exempt from any standards of decency.

The shameful spat could not have been worse timed. Tonight Liverpool and Juventus meet for the first time since the ill-fated European Cup final clash of almost 20 years ago at the decrepit Heysel Stadium in Belgium.

In all the outbursts of mayhem that so scarred the English game during its darkest days of the 1970s and 1980s, none was more lethal than that red surge of Liverpool fans into the opposing legion. As a wall collapsed 39 Juventus followers were left dead. That's almost two-score of fathers, sons, uncles, nephews, cousins, who journeyed to a football match and did not return home alive.

Some 14 of the 26 Liverpool fans who were charged were jailed, while Liverpool were deservedly dealt a lengthy European ban. However, because the then British government led by Mrs Thatcher wanted to make an example of football's wreckers - hooliganism was dubbed 'the English disease' even though it razored angrily across Europe - all English clubs were banned for five years from taking part in European competitions.

That left teams such as Norwich City, League Cup winners in 1985, and then top-flight champions Everton, who had won the European Cup-Winners' Cup without incident just a few weeks before Heysel, cheated out of their right to play on the Continent.

And as that wretched chapter demonstrated, double standards were not exclusively confined to today's modern footballers.

Europe's governing body, UEFA, not only endorsed the exile of all English clubs, they themselves escaped any censure for staging a major European final in a stadium, whose structure was literally crumbling and where policing and stewarding was far from adequate.

And UEFA are still culpable of double standards.

All would agree that one death at a football game is unacceptable, let alone the 39 at Heysel, or the two Leeds United supporters fatally stabbed four years ago ahead of a Champions League tie against Galatasaray in Turkey. But were Galatasaray banned or other Turkish clubs punished? No, Galatasaray were barely tapped on the knuckles with a fine. Scandalous.

Updated: 09:18 Tuesday, April 05, 2005