Italy's new hooligan laws are working with incidents sharply down and fans starting to return to grounds, a panel on sports events said Thursday.
Crowds at Serie A matches were more than ten percent up in the first half of this season compared to the same period in 2007-2008, the interior ministry's National Observatory on Sporting Events (ONMS) said.
At all levels of professional soccer, arrests were more than 50% down.
The number of people wounded was 66% lower and the number of police hurt was more than 40% down.
After the introduction of English-style stewards to take on policing duties, some 30,000 fewer police were employed in the first half of the Serie A season, allowing the state to save more than seven million euros, the ONMS said.
''The results of this new strategy are a major strategic victory,'' the ONMS said.
It hailed the work of police in isolating hooligans and a match safety analysis committee that bans away fans from risky fixtures or even orders some matches to be played behind closed doors.
''All this has reassured fans who are animated only by sporting passion,'' ONMS said.
It added that the return of ''real'' fans had ''boosted spectacle''.
But it called for ''further action'' to provide fans fuller entertainment packages ''typical of the biggest European stadiums, where supporters are treated as clients''.
The ONMS figures backed up statements last year from National Police Chief Antonio Manganelli who spoke of ''extraordinary results'' since tougher football violence laws were passed after the death of a policeman in February 2007.
The government passed the anti-violence package following the death of 38-year-old police officer Filippo Raciti at a stadium riot in Sicily.
Based on the British model of battling hooliganism, it featured stiffer punishment for people convicted of offences, the banning of block ticket sales for away fans and an increase in steward presence (one for every 150-250 fans) at soccer matches.
The government also insisted that stadiums respect a previous 2005 law, which requires them to have electric turnstiles, be equipped with video surveillance, and issue tickets with the buyer's name and seat number in order to make it easier to identify hooligans.
Further efforts have been made since November 2007, when a fresh wave of violence raged across the country after a policeman's bullet left 26-year-old Lazio fan Gabriele Sandri dead at a Tuscan service station.
Football hooligans took the law into their own hands, and in Rome around 400 Lazio and Roma fans ran amok near the Olympic Stadium, attacking three police stations, burning vehicles and wounding 40 officers.
Answering Manganelli's plea to keep the fight against stadium violence alive, The National Youth Forum launched a new publicity campaign called''Kick out violence - use your head to put a goal in the net''.
The campaign featured ads with top soccer players broadcast both on television and on big screens in stadiums, schools and motorway service stations.
In addition, young football fans were invited to send videos with anti-violence messages to a special website (www.daiuncalcioallaviolenza.it).
Last September fresh anti-hooligan ads were broadcast on TV, at cinemas and on the Internet.
