Three hours before a match, Fontajau is already active. Neither the players nor the referees nor the fans are there yet, the three main ingredients of the show, but the police sergeant Sergi Manero is already in the pavilion, who since this year has assumed the duties of security coordinator on the days when Basketball Girona plays. With the promotion to the ACB this figure, which Girona FC has had throughout its stage in professional football, has been mandatory to enforce the sports law, which stipulates which are the professional leagues and which devices security must be deployed there. Although the Uni players are also, the State does not recognize the Women’s League with this rank and, therefore, the police presence is less.
From 2005 to the present (18 years of experience) Manero is the Head of the Citizen Security Unit of the ABP Sant Feliu de Guíxols. He volunteered for the position, which combines with his regular job, because he is a big sports fan and wanted to do a different job, although not that much, because coordinating security devices at big events already does from Sant Feliu in events such as the S’Agaró Economics Conference, the Porta Ferrada Festival or the Carnivals.
Manero goes through all the previous information about the matches. During the week he meets with the club, the Municipal Police, the private security company, the SEM and those responsible for the pavilion to specify the device. Saturday was a special day with the visit of Barça, but the work did not differ too much beyond strengthening the control at the entrance to the pavilion so that there were no problems with the fans waiting for the departure and arrival of the visiting team. “There were also more VIPS and we have to take that into account,” he explains.
The coordinator is in charge of convening a preliminary meeting “where it is about the specific match, it is analyzed with the data and information available on the number of fans of the rival, timetables, expected attendance, personalities who can attend , acts that take place during the duel, the specific device for the day of the match, the effectives that will participate, the opening time of the doors, cuts in access etc..». Manero, for example, decided that for security reasons it was necessary to cut off the road in front of the pavilion to traffic “because we are still on terrorist alert 4 and, beyond that, we also have easier and more comfortable access on foot to the “fan”. As in the case of Montilivi, in Fontajau there is also an Operational Control Unit (UCO), although without security cameras like those in the football stadium that allow dozens of eyes to watch over the stand. “The pavilion is easier to control, it is also well designed and at the UCO what we have there is a space to meet at rest and also an alternative public address system that overrides the main one and that if we have to evict or give some indication to the public we could use».
The security apparatus of an ACB party can move between 40 and 50 troops between the public order teams (ARRO), Citizen Security of the Cos de Mossos d’esquadra, of the Municipal Police of Girona, security guards and contracted auxiliaries for the club Sergi Manero details that there have been no incidents throughout the season and makes it clear that the Girona fans “are very healthy and exemplary”. The club chaired by Marc Gasol has 4,100 subscribers in a pavilion with a capacity for 5,200 spectators “and this means that there are very few tickets for sale and that the rivals can barely bring people”. In addition, Manero assesses that “basketball fans, in general, are very good, there are no radicals like in football, and in the case of Girona we find a very familiar and healthy audience”. At the beginning of the season, some supporters were surprised by the fact that helmets or umbrellas were not allowed inside. There was also some problem with lunch boxes for small children “but we also have to have a little left hand and we have been allowing it”. “Girona, even though 15 years ago it already had a long history in the ACB, now it’s a newly arrived team that falls in love”, receives the security coordinator, who has Sergeant David Casellas as a substitute in case one day cannot take the position.
Although they are different events, Manero has extensive experience from his work in Sant Feliu in the coordination of mass events, such as the Porta Ferrada concerts or the Carnivals in different places in the central Costa Brava. He believes that one difference is “the type of audience”, although what it ultimately comes down to “is that everyone can be comfortable and enjoy the show”. And you, Sergeant, can you enjoy the show? “You’re always focused, but yes, you only have a moment to watch the game”, he confesses, smiling.