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Football

15th May 2019

Manchester City deny accusations of players singing offensive chant aboard plane

Manchester City have denied accusations of their players singing an offensive chant while on board an aeroplane following their Premier League title win

Reuben Pinder

The song contains the lyric ‘battered in the streets’

Manchester City have denied accusations that their players were singing an offensive chant while on board an aeroplane following their Premier League title win at Brighton.

Footage circulated on social media from inside the plane, with people audibly singing a popular chant among City fans, which spoofs Liverpool’s ‘Allez Allez Allez’ chant.

Accusations of the players mocking tragedies were levelled at City due to the song containing the lines: ‘battered in the streets’ and ‘the victims of it all’, which some claimed refer to the attack on Séan Cox and the Hillsborough disaster.

Séan Cox was attacked and put in a coma by Roma fans outside Anfield before Liverpool’s Champions League semi-final last season.

City, however, have since issued a statement clarifying: “Any suggestion that the lyrics relate to Sean Cox or the Hillsborough tragedy is entirely without foundation.

“The song in question, which has been a regular chant during the 2018-19 season, refers to the 2018 Uefa Champions League final in Kiev. Any suggestion that the lyrics relate to Sean Cox or the Hillsborough tragedy is entirely without foundation.”