Telford father and son pepper sprayed and feared crush during Champions League final horror

Mickey Baker, a lifelong Liverpool fan from Trench, Telford, was in the midst of the terrifying chaos outside the Stade de France in Paris, with his 14-year-old son Declan.

Mr Baker, 40, who is head of football at Wellington Amateurs, has told how he and his son were both caught in pepper spray fired three times by police, while he feared a tragic crush as thousands of supporters were funnelled into dangerously small areas.

He has also told how locals had indiscriminately attacked Liverpool supporters trapped in the queues outside the stadium, tried to steal wallets, phones and tickets, and had then tried to jump barriers and fences to get inside.

Both the UK Government and Liverpool Football Club have called for an investigation into what went wrong.

On Saturday evening French officials blamed the situation, which led to the kick off being delayed, on thousands of fans turning up with fake tickets – but a number of high profile journalists who were present have disputed the claims, detailing shambolic and dangerous organisation and policing.

The view has been backed up by footage from numerous social media accounts showing thousands of fans queuing to get into the stadium.

Mr Baker said the opportunity of a lifetime had been ruined and turned into a horrifying and dangerous experience.

Despite arriving at the St Denis ground at 6.15pm – for a 9pm kick off – and having only a 15 minute walk, Mr Baker did not get inside the stadium until half time.

He was part of a dangerous delay where Liverpool supporters were funnelled up a road towards the stadium – which had been partially blocked with police riot vans, causing a bottleneck.

Then as the queue approached the stadium a checkpoint for tickets at a ramp – with only space for a few fans – made the bottleneck even worse as Liverpool supporters waited to get through.

Mr Baker said it created a "massive backlog".

He said: "It was early 20 degrees so pretty hot, there were no stewards, the police were standing on the side with people saying '"what's going on, people are going to get crushed in here," you had little kids getting stuck between adults."

Mr Baker explained that as the fans were queuing local Parisian gangs had joined in the queue and were trying to steal off those waiting to get in.

After finally getting to the queue for the stadium's turn-styles at 7.55pm they faced another backlog as officials struggled to get people into the ground.

After queuing for another half an hour only 100 metres from the stadium, queuing fans from behind were then allowed into the same area, with Mr Baker saying: "I saw people jumping the fence, I saw two Liverpool fans hop the fence, I am not going to lie, they both got caught, I saw 50 people – not Liverpool fans, not Liverpool colours, causing havoc, jumping over railings, pushing their way through the gate, going over the top of the turnstyles."

Mr Baker said that both he and his son had been caught in pepper spray as police tried to deal with the issues.

He said: "The people further up, it was not Liverpool fans, it was local yobs, a lot wearing PSG tops, trying to force their way in and they were pepper sprayed. The wind blew it back down and it got a lot of fans."

He added: "While this is happening you have got about 300 youths running past us towards the gates, but some were dipping in and out of the queue, punching people, trying to get a reaction."

"Some had their faces covered up and they were there for one reason and one reason only, to cause trouble and get into the stadium."

Mr Baker said that fans had been let down by the organisation.

He said: "99.99 per cent of Liverpool fans outside that stadium behaved impeccably. They just wanted to watch their team and they were not able to do that safely. I do not know what they will unearth when they investigate it it but something has clearly gone very wrong – it was shambolic."

Mr Baker said that even after the game had finished he had been left fearful as fans were targeted by gangs on their way away from the stadium.

He said: "I felt frightened. I felt scared, I am not afraid to say it. There were pockets of them and they were sprinting out, attacking people, attacking Real Madrid fans too, stealing jewellery, wallets, whatever they could get their hands on.

"I saw one lad crying with what looked like blood on his face.

"They were like a pack of dogs looking for prey. They attacked women, they attacked minors, it was a very very horrible and unpleasant place to be."

He added: "When we got out of there was just a massive relief. As soon as I knew we were on the coach going back to Amsterdam I was finally able to rest because I was away from that area.

"Devastated does not cut it. I am not even bothered about the result. It is the whole experience, the logistics of getting there were what I was nervous about but that was fine, it was the easiest part of getting into the stadium that was an absolute nightmare."