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• Fans in Macedonia seen making ‘monkey taunts’
• Uefa await reports from referee and delegate

Uefa have confirmed they are aware of claims that racist chants were directed at Liverpool’s players during last night’s Europa League qualifying game against Rabotnicki in Macedonia. The governing body are waiting to assess reports from both the Uefa delegate and the referee before taking any action against Rabotnicki.

Liverpool won the first leg of their third qualifying round tie 2-0 with David Ngog scoring both goals. But pictures emerged after the game that showed Rabotnicki fans appearing to direct so-called “monkey taunts” at Liverpool players.

Liverpool started the game with two black players – Ngog and the impressive 19-year-old winger David Amoo. A spokesman for Uefa told the Press Association: “We are aware of the matter but we are waiting for the reports from the delegate and the referee.”

Once Uefa have assessed the reports, a disciplinary case could be opened against Rabotnicki. Macedonian football has had problems with racism and their governing body was fined after Emile Heskey, Ashley Cole and Sol Campbell were subjected to abuse during an international against England in 2003.

LiverpoolUefaEuropa Leagueguardian.co.uk

It felt as if Liverpool had let English football down, when for 20 years they had been its finest ambassador

Phil Neal can recall arriving at the Heysel stadium 25 years ago tomorrow and being distinctly underwhelmed by its appearance. “My first thought was that it barely stood comparison with Wembley or Rome or other grounds where Liverpool had won the European Cup,” he says. “The game would have sold out any stadium in Europe, yet instead of Barcelona or Madrid we got Heysel with its frail-looking fence. I would still like to know who made that decision and on what grounds, because the tragedy could have been avoided.”

By the close of the 1980s English football was well versed in tragedy, yet there was a recurring theme to the grim progression that began with the Bradford City fire a couple of weeks before Liverpool’s 1985 European Cup final against Juventus and ended with the Hillsborough disaster four years later. While the causes may have been different, in every case the loss of life was avoidable.

The problem at Valley Parade had been the entirely predictable consequences, at least from a modern safety perspective, of a discarded cigarette, a wooden stand and a shameful build-up of combustible rubbish below. The blame at Heysel was laid squarely at the door of Liverpool supporters by Uefa the day after 39 people died. By charging at their Italian counterparts the English contingent had to bear direct responsibility for the panic and crush that followed, even the collapse of an inadequate dividing wall that increased the death toll. “Only the English fans were responsible,” Uefa’s official observer, Gunter Schneider, said at the time. “Of that there is no doubt.”

While that may be the case in terms of strict cause and effect, Uefa managed to get off lightly. Without an official inquiry into the disaster, the controlling body for European football never had to defend its decision to stage a showpiece game at an obviously dilapidated venue. The stadium authorities and Belgian police were never questioned either. Heysel was demolished and rebuilt in 1994, without hosting another major game in the interim.

The Liverpool fans had found it ridiculously easy to break through the flimsy wire fence that separated them from the Juventus supporters, and while that does not make them any less culpable, the confrontation began with both sets of fans throwing stones at each other across the barriers. Stones they found lying on the floor, inside the stadium, either hard-core from underneath the terracing or bits of crumbling steps. Heysel had struck Arsenal fans who had visited a few years earlier as a “dump”. It was a far from ideal venue for a major European final.

There was nothing particularly wrong, by the standards of the day, with Hillsborough in 1989. The reason 96 lives were lost was because we had become careless about the way we watched football. Careless enough to accept pens and cages as the only alternative to hooliganism and pitch invasions. Careless enough not to think about the crush consequences of letting a crowd build up then releasing it into a confined space.

Even as the disaster was unfolding in Liverpool’s FA Cup semi-final with Nottingham Forest people formed the natural conclusion that some sort of disturbance was taking place, and assumed the supporters trying to scale the barriers – poignantly the ones who had arrived at the ground early to secure a place at the front – were seeking to run on to the pitch or fight with neighbours. Only in the horrific aftermath of Hillsborough were lessons properly learned, with the Taylor Report paving the way for all-seat stadiums, CCTV, adequate stewarding and meaningful safety certificates.

Back in 1985, preparing for the biggest game of his life, Neal innocently imagined he would be following a glorious Liverpool tradition, rather than leading the club into its darkest period. The only player to appear in all four of Liverpool’s European Cup victories between 1977 and 1984, Neal was captain by the time of their fifth final, with every expectation of rounding off his Anfield years on a personal high. “I anticipated lifting the silverware,” he says. “It was going to be another glory night and I would go up the steps first.

“Looking back now means looking across Hillsborough, which involved an even greater loss of life, but in 1985 Heysel was the worst thing imaginable. It felt as if Liverpool had let English football down, when for 20 years they had been its finest ambassador. That’s what really turned our stomachs, the feeling that the club’s impeccable record over two decades in Europe had ended in something so horrific.”

Kenny Dalglish, who would take over as manager when Joe Fagan stepped down after an uneasy couple of years, makes the same point. “Liverpool made it public in advance that they were concerned about the state of the stadium,” he says. “Uefa said they must continue. Liverpool did all the warning, Liverpool made every effort to prevent trouble between fans, and when the worst happened Liverpool received all the blame.”

English clubs were banned from Europe for five years as a result of Heysel, and needed at least that long again to catch up when they were allowed back. Some Everton fans have never forgiven Liverpool for preventing them entering the European Cup as English champions that year, arguing that a potentially great team had to be disbanded instead of getting the chance to grow with European experience. And on an unreal, unnatural, unforgiveable night in Brussels, Liverpool lost a European Cup final for the first time.

Fearing further crowd problems if the match was abandoned, the game took place after an interminable delay. Both sides played as if in shock. Juventus won through a Michel Platini penalty. Neal does not remember kicking a ball. “I have absolutely no recollection of the match,” he says. “The delay in the dressing rooms was bad enough, but as soon as we heard people had died we lost all interest in the match. The difference between then and now is that now we know watching football can be a matter of life and death. At Heysel we still had it all to find out.”

LiverpoolFootball violenceUefaPaul Wilsonguardian.co.uk

• Carragher recalls time Liverpool crashed out in 2002
• Defender implores Liverpool to ride out tough spell

Of all the injuries and ailments that have hindered Liverpool this season there can be nothing more disturbing for Rafael Benítez than the seven-year itch contracted by Jamie Carragher. It was November 2002 when Liverpool last exited the Champions League at the group stage, as a season that began amid high expectation became a salvage operation all too quickly. A defender of his intuition cannot fail to sense the warnings from history.

“You talk in the dressing room when things aren’t going well. You wonder when the feelgood factor will come back and I have mentioned that time to some of the lads,” the Liverpool defender said. “I’ve spoken to my dad and he said we’ve had five years of winning big trophies, getting to another Champions League final, going close in the league and that this might just be a difficult season. It might be a grind and you have to tough it out, get your head down and fight. That’s not just football. It’s the same in life. It’s no different for us as footballers. You have to keep going and show character.”

Carragher’s grim acceptance of Liverpool’s plight is understandable. Benítez’s team could claim their second win in 11 matches in all competitions against Debrecen tonight and still be in mourning should Fiorentina defeat visiting Lyon to qualify at their expense. So long as hope remains this Liverpool team will fight on, but there is helplessness to their predicament that returns Carragher to 2002.

Liverpool entered the 2002-03 season talking of the Premier League title, their argument backed by a runners-up spot the previous season and a summer of fine-tuning in the transfer market – if spending £20m on El Hadji Diouf, Salif Diao and Bruno Cheyrou can be called fine-tuning.

Two chastening losses to a sublime Valencia side managed by one Rafael Benítez, who left an indelible impression on the Anfield directors in the process, saw Liverpool floundering in their Champions League group. A stirring recovery from three down to draw in Basle could not prevent demotion into the Uefa Cup, and a run of 11 league games without a win cost them a top-four finish. The reign of Gérard Houllier, who publicly blamed Steven Gerrard for the Basle result and replaced the young midfielder at half-time with Diao, never recovered.

“I have spoken to some of the lads about that season,” Carragher said. “A lot was expected of us then and it didn’t work out. Everyone thinks all we have at Liverpool is great times, but there are ups and downs. Stevie and I know that. You get through it by facing up to it. You get through it by believing you have good players, and in the past four or five years we have shown that. We are not a bad team. We are good team that is just not doing the right things at the moment. At these times you need to show determination and character and it is up to the big players to lead.”

The financial ramifications of exiting the Champions League at this juncture will be sorely felt at Anfield or, more accurately, in the US. While the club can accommodate the impact of Champions League failure in the budget for this season it will not help the American owners’ search for new investors willing to meet their asking price of £100m for a 25% stake to be consigned to the Europa League. On the field, however, Carragher denies a Fiorentina victory tonight would be a calamity for Benítez’s team.

“When you start out you are desperate to get through the group stages, but I don’t think you could call it a disaster if we don’t. Because we have done well in recent seasons people outside the club tend to take it for granted that Liverpool will get into the knockout stages. But it isn’t easy. Manchester United didn’t make it through a few years ago and Barcelona have had a couple of setbacks this season and aren’t sure of making it. It shows how well we have done in the past.

“If we don’t make it through then we have to accept it and move on. Stevie and myself have won the Uefa Cup and it was a great moment. It is still a chance to win silverware and there are some great teams in that competition. Benfica looked really strong against Everton, and Valencia are in it too. Obviously, we are all still hoping we are in the Champions League come Tuesday night. Whatever happens, you have to move on and look forward.”

LiverpoolChampions LeagueAndy Hunterguardian.co.uk