The Nika Rebellion drew a rising Roman general against some rioting sports fans, and it was a tense game.
In a brilliant but turbulent career, Flavius Belisarius (?505-565) would recover North Africa from the Vandals and Rome from the Ostrogoths, and he would save Constantinople (the imperial capital) from the Huns. But before all this happened, he was involved in quite a different kind of campaign, the Nika Rebellion of 532, which began as a brawl amongst sports hooligans.