Court hands the title to Olympiacos

1556 Views 20 Replies 8 Participants Last post by GiannisAEK, Apr 29, 2008

Icarus

Discussion Starter · Apr 21, 2008

http://www.uefa.com/footballeurope/news/kind=2/newsid=686195.html

Court hands the title to Olympiacos
Monday 21 April 2008

by Vassiliki Papantonopoulou from Athens

Olympiacos CFP have been confirmed as Greek champions after a case that would have seen them docked three points was dismissed by the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS).

Appeal launched
The destination of the title had been thrown into doubt after Apollon Kalamarias FC appealed against a decision to award them a technical defeat in a game against Olympiacos on 3 February, which the strugglers won 1-0. Kalamarias were penalised for fielding a player, Roman Wallner, who had already played for two clubs this season – Scottish sides Falkirk FC and Hamilton Academical FC.

Ruling upheld
Kalamarias petitioned the CAS, preventing the Hellenic Football Federation from handing the Greek crown to Olympiacos. AEK Athens FC would have triumphed had the CAS overturned the original decision, but in the event the independent Lausanne-based body upheld the first ruling – enabling Olympiacos to celebrate their 36th league title and their eleventh in the last 12 campaigns.

Next goal
Josep Segura, who replaced Panagiotis Lemonis as Olympiacos coach on 11 March, said: "I want to dedicate this victory to the fans, who have helped us a lot, to the players who have gone through some hard times, and to the club's administration for putting their trust in me. The Olympiacos players are great professionals. Our next goal is to win the Greek Cup." Olympiacos completed their fixtures with a 3-1 home victory over Iraklis FC on Sunday.

Record broken
The success was particularly sweet for Olympiacos captain Predrag Djordjević. The 35-year-old Serbian midfielder has set a Greek record in landing his eleventh championship, while team-mate Christos Patsatzoglou said: "This is the sweetest and – at the same time – the toughest league we have won in recent years. In the final stretch we were more durable than our rivals."

Play-off contest
AEK finished the season with Greece's top scorer – 19-goal Ismael Blanco – and also with the Super League's best attacking and defensive records. They now join Panathinaikos FC, Aris Thessaloniki FC and Panionios GSS in the end-of-season play-offs. The winning team will earn a UEFA Champions League second qualifying round slot, with the runners-up securing a place in the same round of the UEFA Cup.

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Olympiakos should hand their tainted trophy to the illegal Kalamaria player for he is the main reason why Olympiakos won the title. Oympiakos is so lucky for being at the right place and at the right time for Kalamaria to field an illegal player.

AEK scored the most goals, allowed the fewest goals, had the best goal diferential, the most wins, the fewest losses, the best goal scorer (Blanco), and the most assists (Rivaldo). Since Olympiakos is the champion on paper, and "scored" 3 goals against a Kalamaria team that beat them 1-0, then those 3 goals should be awarded to Kovacevic, the Olympiakos player who was second on the top goal-scorer list, 2 goals behind AEK's Blanco, and make him the top goal-scorer on paper as well? This is possible, for the head of EPO, Gagatsis, worked for Olympiakos from 1995-1997 as a general adviser/consultant.

Why not have the AEK-Olympiakos 4-0 game declared null and void as well? AEK should boycott the playoffs. I hope Aris does Greek soccer a favor on May 17 and beat Olympiakos.

An einai dinaton
An einai dinaton
Protathlima paranomo ston Olympiako

Olympiakos are champions of the court (in more ways than one) and AEK are champions on the pitch.

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Icarus

Discussion Starter · #3 · Apr 22, 2008

plato-ny said:
AEK scored the most goals, allowed the fewest goals, had the best goal diferential, the most wins, the fewest losses, the best goal scorer (Blanco), and the most assists (Rivaldo).

This is really telling. The fact of the matter is WE are champions this season and not OSFP.

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Icarus

Discussion Starter · #4 · Apr 22, 2008

AEK's website has an interesting view on the final standings as well.

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AMOROSO!

· #5 · Apr 22, 2008

plato-ny said:
This is possible, for the head of EPO, Gagatsis, worked for Olympiakos from 1995-1997 as a general adviser/consultant.

He worked there for 6 months as a lawyer and before that he worked at PAOK and after that he worked at Iraklis.

The AEK camp is starting to look like a bunch of cry-babies. While they can certainly lay claim to the "moral" title, and in the long run they were the better team, rules are rules. I don't think anyone really thinks Olympiakos deserves the title, to go to the extent of calling it illegal or refusing to participate at the play-offs is just silly.

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Friki

· #6 · Apr 22, 2008

To be fair AMO, it's quite understandable...
Even though the talks about boycotting play-offs is just nonsense...

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AMOROSO!

· #7 · Apr 22, 2008

Friki said:
To be fair AMO, it's quite understandable...

No. Understandable is the righteous claim that they were the best team and deserved to win the league. What I find a bit silly to accept is the claims that it is all a big illegal conspirancy by Olympiakos and EPO. It is quite simple: Did Kalamaria had the right to use Walner? Every legal body that examined the issue decided that no, they didn't. And while we may talk till the end of time about the objectivity of a Greek court etc etc the fact is that CAS cannot be possibly subject to the same discussion and came to exactly the same conclusion.

Therefore, while the tactics and arguments used by Olympiakos are petty and embarassing, they are not illegal. I'm by no means sympathetic to Olympiakos and AEK thoroughly deserved the championship, but they aren't winning any fans with their behaviour.

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Ano Gavrio

· #8 · Apr 22, 2008

Agreed.

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george_acp

· #9 · Apr 22, 2008

http://www.sport24.gr/html/ent/186/ent.231186.asp

Maybe the case is not over yet...

Αυτός είναι και ένας από τους λόγους για τους οποίους, η επικύρωση της βαθμολογίας του πρωταθλήματος δεν έπρεπε να γίνει. Όχι τόσο για λόγους ρητορικών επιχειρημάτων, αλλά κυρίως διότι η γραμματική ερμηνεία του Κανόνα 20.3 του ΚΑΠ, επιβάλει την μη επικύρωση της βαθμολογίας του πρωταθλήματος, όσο υπάρχει διαδικασία έφεσης σε εξέλιξη. Επιπρόσθετα, πιστοποιεί και το σκεπτικό του νομοθέτη, το οποίο προσβλέπει στην πρόληψη των προαναφερθέντων προβλημάτων.

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george_acp

· #10 · Apr 22, 2008

http://www.contra.gr/Soccer/Hellas/Superleague/AEK/196355.html

"War" between AEK and EPO.

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GiannisAEK

· #11 · Apr 22, 2008

Sitting back and letting this corruption stand is not an option (the legality of Walner was not an issue in the CAS decision as it was solely based on the relevance of AK's desire for the four points they lost, not on weither or not Walner was legal). Someone needs to stand up against it and i'm glad AEK is at the forefront.

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AMOROSO!

· #12 · Apr 23, 2008

AEK is not standing up for anything but themselves. They would have been perfectly happy to win the league in exactly the same way as Olympiakos.

By the way, it's all getting increasingly embarassing as EPO is sueing Demis for his comments. The FA is actually sueing a club's president. Remarkable.

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plato-ny

· #13 · Apr 23, 2008

AMOROSO! said:
No. Understandable is the righteous claim that they were the best team and deserved to win the league. What I find a bit silly to accept is the claims that it is all a big illegal conspirancy by Olympiakos and EPO. It is quite simple: Did Kalamaria had the right to use Walner? Every legal body that examined the issue decided that no, they didn't. And while we may talk till the end of time about the objectivity of a Greek court etc etc the fact is that CAS cannot be possibly subject to the same discussion and came to exactly the same conclusion.

Therefore, while the tactics and arguments used by Olympiakos are petty and embarassing, they are not illegal. I'm by no means sympathetic to Olympiakos and AEK thoroughly deserved the championship, but they aren't winning any fans with their behaviour.

CAS never declared anything other than the matter is an EPO matter and not a CAS matter. CAS never said anything about the player being legal or not. Kalamaria deserved to be punished for fielding an illegal player, but who approved the transfer to Kalamaria? EPO. So, EPO blindly approves this illegal transfer and because of this transfer, Olympiakos is awarded 3 gift points for a game they lost??? What is more puzzling is that Gagatsis and half of EPO were at the Olympiakos-Iraklis match.

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AMOROSO!

· #14 · Apr 23, 2008

plato-ny said:
CAS never declared anything other than the matter is an EPO matter and not a CAS matter. CAS never said anything about the player being legal or not.

No. What CAS actually said was that Kalamaria had no legal standing to object to the validation of the league table because there was "very little" (law term for "none at all") chance of them being vindicated should they decide to take the Walner case to CAS. Reading through the legal procedure and jargon, this means that the decision taken by the Greek court is correct and CAS would uphold it.

Kalamaria deserved to be punished for fielding an illegal player, but who approved the transfer to Kalamaria? EPO.

EPO argues that it is their job to approve transfers when all things are in place, not to issue warnings that this or that player is inelligible. It was Kalamaria's job to check these things out, even by asking EPO. Kalamaria never asked about it, and they never got a reply telling them to use Walner or otherwise. Had EPO actually told them that he can be used then we would have a problem. But they didn't.

So, EPO blindly approves this illegal transfer and because of this transfer, Olympiakos is awarded 3 gift points for a game they lost???

Walner was used against Olympiakos. Who else should get the points?

What is more puzzling is that Gagatsis and half of EPO were at the Olympiakos-Iraklis match.

Yeah well, that tells a lot about EPO and their connections with Olympiakos but is irrelevant when it comes to the Walner issue. Even if Gagatsis was a hardcore Olympiakos fan (he's not by the way), the Walner issue was a matter of rules. And rules are rules.

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Icarus

Discussion Starter · #15 · Apr 24, 2008

Why are you defending the cheats?

They LOST that game but were awarded a victory. All the rest is bullshit. If the player was ineligible then EPO should not have approved the transfer. They DID and no its not Kalamaria's responsibility to do EPOs job, nor is AEK out to win any fans.

More farce from the Greek league and the kleftogavri.

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AMOROSO!

· #16 · Apr 24, 2008

Icarus said:
Why are you defending the cheats?

Because on this occasion, they are right.

And yeah, it's easy to say "they lost in the pitch, all the rest is bullshit" but you know, from then on we can just do away with rules and teams using players who are suspended, or players they signed in March, or players who are dopped-up, or field 11 Brazilians... all of these are rules that exist and everyone accepts them when they sign the league protocol at the start of the season. There are some things you just can't do and although Kalamaria's mistake was not as obvious, it was still a mistake as CAS showed.

I do share your frustration though. AEK deserved to win and missed out due to something out of their control. But it doesn't mean it is unfair on anything else than a moral level.

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Finrod_HELLAS

· #17 · Apr 24, 2008

AMOROSO! said:
EPO argues that it is their job to approve transfers when all things are in place, not to issue warnings that this or that player is inelligible. It was Kalamaria's job to check these things out, even by asking EPO. Kalamaria never asked about it, and they never got a reply telling them to use Walner or otherwise. Had EPO actually told them that he can be used then we would have a problem. But they didn't.

You are wrong here I think. If he is ineligible to go to Kalamaria (like Couzen in the Rangers-Fulham),then EPO shouldn't have given him the permission to have a deltio.

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Icarus

Discussion Starter · #18 · Apr 25, 2008

Amoroso, the federation approved the transfer. THAT'S the end of it! There is nothing after this to argue about. Kalamaria doesn't sign or play him if EPO doesn't approve. They then have every right to play him. Any problems after that are between OSFP and EPO.

The gays lost 1-0 on the pitch but were handed a 3-0 victory from the federation. This is simply bullshit.

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Friki

· #19 · Apr 25, 2008

As far as I know, every FA (like EPO) mustn't approve the transfers since you can buy players and let them play without them being avaible for it, BUT if Wallner was registered with EPO as a Kalamaria player before the game then it's beyond bullshit.

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plato-ny

· #20 · Apr 26, 2008

Even CNN has an article on its website that says that OSFP was giftwrapped the title and now the EPO are being investigated in a tax probe involving discrepancies and a large number of payments that are untraceable. Way to go EPO and OSFP and all this before the Euro.

EPO=Etairia Prostasias Olympiako

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