Aston Villa will be hosting Israeli team Maccabi Tel Aviv in a Europa League match in Birmingham on Nov. 6. Last week, The Athletic reported that the West Midlands Police had requested that Maccabi fans be barred from the stadium and prevented from buying tickets to the match. The police, in consultation with Aston Villa and the city's Safety Advisory Group, requested that UEFA withhold approval of the standard allotment of tickets that would normally be made available to away fans, citing "a number of physical and safety factors."

The decision to keep Maccabi fans out of Birmingham is fully justified, and not out of step with how other European club competitions have been run in the past. It is not uncommon for away fans to be banned from matches based on previous instances of violent conduct, or the potential for future clashes between supporters. The city of Birmingham's concerns about what might happen if Maccabi fans descend on Villa Park are well-founded: Birmingham has a high Muslim population; in the run-up to a Europa League game against Ajax last November, racist and violent Maccabi fans wreaked havoc all over Amsterdam. Groups of Maccabi fans spent multiple days in Amsterdam, clashing...