Over the last century, very few fixtures in football carry history and blood much like the Dockers’ Derby between West Ham United and Millwall FC.
It has been more than 14 years since the two London giants last met, and the wait is set to end this Saturday at The Den.
This fixture is going to be their first meeting since 2012, when the Hammers secured a 2-1 win at Upton Park.
The 126-year-old rivalry is bound to be a tense affair, hence it was weird to see an image of a half and half scarve being sold on the official Millwall website ahead of the fixture.
A user on X with the username Hammer_on_X claimed that Millwall’s official website was selling scarves with their iconic Lion Crest alongside the Hammers in a combination of Dark Blue/White and Maroon/Light Blue stripes.
West Ham have already been in the news last season for banning half-and-half scarves in the London Derby against Spurs, and news of them featuring on the same merchandise as their bitter rivals on the opposite side of the Thames has fumed fans.
However, his image was later debunked as an AI-generated image because users could differentiate between the fake offer code(MILLWALLINBREDS) mentioned on his image and the real one(LIONSFREEDEL).
Even the domains of the website differed, which further proved the inauthenticity of the user’s image. On the official Millwall store, there were no such scarves on sale, as they sold only three types of scarves in their navy blue colour and the tagline ‘No One Likes Us.’
Irrespective of their sales happening unofficially or inside third-party shops, the half and half scarves are considered by season ticket holders as a commercial gimmick used to lure tourist fans. Usually, such merchandise is often released when the hype around a fixture is massive or if it’s a major European or Cup final.
For a hardcore West Ham or Millwall fan, even the mere thought of seeing either of their iconic Hammer or Lion crests in synergy with each other on a piece of merchandise would be unacceptable due to their quite literally bloody history.
