Police Gear Up for Euro 2004 Finals

Police expect as many as 50,000 English football fans to descend on Portugal next summer following the team's qualification for the finals of Euro 2004, secured with a goalless draw against Turkey in Istanbul on Saturday night.

Fears that the match would be marred by violence between supporters proved groundless as the majority of English fans heeded warnings to stay away following the Football Association's decision to refuse tickets for the game.

Just a handful of English fans made it into the Sukru Saracoglu stadium in Istanbul following an unprecedented joint security operation by the Turkish and British authorities involving 5,000 police.

British police will now turn their attention to preventing a hardcore of troublemakers from travelling to the Iberian peninsula next summer. More than 1,800 hooligans are already subject to banning orders which require them to surrender their passports when England play abroad, and a further 500 individuals believed to be involved in football-related disorder will now be targeted in a nationwide operation.

David Swift, deputy chief constable of Staffordshire and head of the English policing team, said that while the operation for Saturday night's game had been a success, circumstances would be different in the summer.

Turkish immigration authorities interviewed all British nationals entering the country in the days leading up to the game, and turned back 45 people believed to be intending to travel to the match.

Police set up three security cordons around the ground and demanded to see Turkish identity cards before allowing people through.

Ten England fans were turned back at the turnstiles, including a couple in their 50s from Hampshire, but there was no trouble in or around the stadium or in the city afterwards, and there were no arrests.

"We have to accept that this game is unique in terms of no tickets being issued and the border controls, which allowed the Turkish to control who entered and who did not, and that things will be different with a big tournament inside the European Union," Mr Swift said.

"For a normal big-city game like this we could expect up to 20,000 England supporters to travel, so for just a handful to have made it is good news. In the summer, however, there could be as many as 50,000 fans travelling to Portugal.

"In an average summer there would probably be around 200,000 British nationals holidaying at any one time, so our challenge is to exclude as many people as possible who might be intent on causing trouble before then.

The police operation in Istanbul followed warnings from Uefa that England and Turkey risked elimination from the competition if violent scenes marred the game.

Paul Barber, the FA's director of communications, thanked the fans for cooperating. "England fans showed they are prepared to listen and that they are prepared to stay away from very big games," he said. "We would like England fans to travel to the next game, wherever it is, but we must remember that the threat from Uefa remains."