{"id":513460,"date":"2026-04-05T01:30:18","date_gmt":"2026-04-05T01:30:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/513460\/"},"modified":"2026-04-05T01:30:18","modified_gmt":"2026-04-05T01:30:18","slug":"march-to-unite-city-after-friar-gate-incident-planned-ahead-of-derby-county-match","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/513460\/","title":{"rendered":"March to unite city after Friar Gate incident planned ahead of Derby County match"},"content":{"rendered":"

There will also be an 18th minute applause to remember the Birmingham City fan Paul Pike, who was found in the River Derwent<\/p>\n

16:47, 04 Apr 2026Updated 16:55, 04 Apr 2026<\/p>\n

\"Derby<\/p>\n

Derby County’s Pride Park stadium.(Image: Barrington Coombs\/PA Wire.)<\/p>\n

Derby County fans are determined to show the world a united city – following the Friar Gate incident on March 28<\/a> – when they march from the Steve Bloomer mural<\/a> to Pride Park Stadium on Easter Monday (April 6) ahead of their match against Stoke City.<\/p>\n

Seven people were injured after a vehicle struck them in the city centre at about 9.30pm and were taken to hospital.<\/p>\n

A 36-year-old Indian national has been charged with six counts of Section 18 grievous bodily harm [GBH<\/a>] with intent, one count of attempted Section 18 GBH with intent, one count of dangerous driving, and one count of possession of a bladed article and remanded in police custody.<\/p>\n

Now club supporters’ group Popside Fanatics<\/a> are spearheading the initiative to show that incidents like Friar Gate “doesn\u2019t break a Derbeian, it makes us stronger, bonds us together more, united as one”.<\/p>\n

They have appealed to fans on social media “to bring flags, scarves, anything black and white” to the march and the ground. The message goes on to say: “Between the 21st minute and 30th minute, please join us in a chant, all sides of the ground.<\/p>\n

“We are also going to walk from the Steve Bloomer mural at 1.45pm to the ground if anyone would like to join us showing that no matter what is thrown at us, we are as one. We again send the injured and witnesses our best wishes and speedy recovery.<\/p>\n

“Derby is a city where we the people come together. As a Derby County Football Club supporters’ group and being Derbeians ourselves, the incident, like many others, hit us to the core which we never thought would happen on our city streets.”<\/p>\n

The 21st and 30th minutes have been chosen because the incident on March 28 took place around 9.30pm.<\/p>\n

The show of solidarity also comes days after missing 18-year-old Birmingham City fan Paul Pike, who disappeared during a match against the Blues at Pride Park Stadium on March 21, was found in the River Derwent on March 29.<\/p>\n

The social media message added: “Along the march we will also like people attending to follow us to the site where a fellow football supporter lost his life to show that, as a football community, we do come together in hard times, placing rivalry aside.<\/p>\n

“There will also be on the 18th minute applause for Paul Pike – the time he left the stadium on the day he went missing – and we would also like to send our sincere condolences to Paul Pike’s family, friends and Birmingham City Football Club.”<\/p>\n

Derby County have placed a floral tribute and Blues items on the seat where Paul Pike was supposed to have spent the match on March 21.<\/p>\n

Rams supporters turned out in force the following week to look for him largely led by Joanne Wallis, who has said on social media that she will be marching on Monday with Mr Pike’s brother.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"There will also be an 18th minute applause to remember the Birmingham City fan Paul Pike, who was…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":513461,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[45743,119400,59,57,58,50,86234,56,54,55],"class_list":{"0":"post-513460","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-united-kingdom","8":"tag-derby-county","9":"tag-easter","10":"tag-gb","11":"tag-great-britain","12":"tag-greatbritain","13":"tag-news","14":"tag-pride-park","15":"tag-uk","16":"tag-united-kingdom","17":"tag-unitedkingdom"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/513460","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=513460"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/513460\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/513461"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=513460"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=513460"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=513460"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}