Talk:1972–73 European Cup Winners' Cup

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User:Wobblyprop created this page with some information regarding the final of the competition being fixed, with the referee being found guilty of taking bribes and being sent to prison. I've not heard of this before, but have no reason to doubt it so I've kept it in as NPOV as possible. However, I think it would look better if we had a link to a source detailing the scandel either online or in a book but I cannot find anything about it. Maybe of somebody has any info (maybe in a Leeds United history book) they could verify it. Cheers, Starfighter Pilot 15:18, 9 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I saw the game live on TV. And I closely followed subsequent events. Mihas, the top Greek referee at the time, was never jailed; in fact, he was not even indicted. But his refereeing did indeed favor Milan, refusing two penalty claims by the Leeds players, at least one of which should have been given. Reports of the ref's one-sidedness, especially local reports, often went to hyperbole. But here is the context : At the time the final was played, FIFA's president Stanley Rous had announced his intention to resign and UEFA's president Artemio Franchi was campaigning for a European, preferably himself, to take over FIFA. The Greek football federation initially threw its support behind Franchi's campaign. The main reason for this was that the regime of the colonel's dictatorship, in a state of relative isolation and insignificance amongst western European nations, was seeking alliances and support in any European institution it could. Reciprocating the support of the Greek federation, Franchi and UEFA could have offered a sports opening for the Greek junta, then at a stage where the regime was keenly attempting a political normalisation. In this context, Greece was awarded the hosting of the UEFA Cup Winners Cup final. When the time came for a Greek referee to be appointed for the game, it would not have been above Franchi, in his capacity as also Italian Football Federation President, to ask the Greek federation for a "fair" treatment of Italian Cup holders AC Milan.
Christos Mihas was indeed a referee widely respected in Greece for his fairness but, during the final, one team got a more fair treatment than the other, and quite blatanbtly so. He never refereed another international game in his life.
There is a coda to this episode, which is yet another apocryphal story, but it probably belongs to the Si non e vero file : The Greek football federation's president at the time, George Dedes, for unknown reasons, eventually withdrew the Greeks' support for Artemio Franchi's bid for the FIFA presidency. In response, it was reported at the time that Franchi "promised" Dedes that no Greek team would progress in a European competition "for the next five years"! This story, over the years, has provided Greek fans with ample explanation for their teams subsequent failures in European competitions. It is, of course, preferable to acknowledging Greek football's overall mediocre quality. The Gnome 16:46, 12 May 2007 (UTC)[reply]

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