Portsmouth protesters mistake Pakistan U19 team for migrants

Anti-immigration protesters gathered outside a Marriott hotel in Portsmouth on 9 September dispersed within five minutes of learning that the young Asian men staying there were the Pakistan Under-19 cricket team, not asylum seekers.

The confusion followed a separate protest in the city on Sunday, when a large dinghy carrying an estimated 140 asylum seekers arrived at Portsmouth's Eastney harbour. A black-clad vigilante group had tried to block streets around the port to stop the arrivals leaving the area. Police ended that demonstration in the early hours of Monday with a dispersal order and threats of arrest.

With tensions still running high, word spread online that a coach and a group of young Asian men had been seen at the Marriott, and protesters returned to the streets. George Madgwick, leader of the Reform UK group on Hampshire county council, was called to the scene. In a Facebook post since deleted, he said the hotel manager and the team's coach explained the situation and showed him proof. He then told the gathered crowd of 40 to 50 people that it was a cricket team, and said they accepted this and left within five minutes.

Andy Burnham condemned the conduct of the Sunday demonstrators as intimidating and thuggish. A spokesperson for the prime minister set out his view of the wider mood on the streets.

«politics of poison seeping into our streets».