Scottish football fans who had descended on London were photographed helping to clear the city’s streets before Friday night’s much-anticipated Euro 2020 game between Scotland and England at Wembley stadium.
Fans wearing kilts and draped in Scotland flags picked up rubbish in Leicester Square, where many had gathered to celebrate and cheer their team on before the fixture, which ended in a scoreless draw.
About 22,000 Scotland supporters travelled to London, although only 2,600 had tickets for the match. Many ignored the Met police’s order to disperse, dancing in the streets and singing “yes sir, I can boogie” throughout the day. Some sprayed officers with alcohol in their enthusiasm.
More than two dozen people were arrested.
Scotland Yard said: “Thirteen arrests were for public order offences, six for drunk and disorderly, four for assault on police, three for assault, two related to class A drugs and one each for breaching a dispersal order and breaching a banning order.”
Fans celebrated late into Friday night before police broke up the “tartan army’s” street party in the early hours of Saturday morning.
TV coverage of the game drew an average audience of 13.1 million, becoming the most-watched match of the tournament so far.
It was also the most-watched football match in terms of peak viewing numbers since ITV’s coverage of England’s World Cup semi-final against Croatia in 2018, which edrew 27.5 million viewers.
An average of 10.2 million people tuned in to watch England’s Euro clash with Croatia on BBC One on 13 June.
