Marinakis stripped of Olympiacos presidency as club awaits CL fate

By Matt Scott
June 19 – Olympiacos’s owner Evangelos ‘Vangelis’ Marinakis must step down as president of the club after a seven-hour plea hearing at an Athens court on Thursday in which he was accused of running a racketeering and match-fixing ring in Greek football.

The five charges Marinakis faced were for establishing and directing a criminal organisation, fraud, attempted extortion, bribery with the aim of fixing matches and instigating an explosion endangering human life. Marinakis denies all the charges.

Consistent with the other alleged ringleaders in the conspiracy, the former Hellenic Football Federation president, Giorgos Sarris, and its former legal adviser, Theodore Kouridis, Marinakis was released on bail. In contrast to the other two, whose bail was set at €50,000, Marinakis’s bond was €200,000.

While the criminal investigation continues, Marinakis has been banned from all football activity – prompting his expected resignation from the Greek champions – and must report to a police station every 15 days.

Marinakis arrived at the plea hearing at 7.20am alongside Savvas Theodoridis, the Olympiacos vice-president and father of the UEFA deputy general secretary, Theodore Theodoridis.

Olympiacos have qualified directly for next season’s Champions League group stage and how UEFA responds to the moves by the Athens criminal courts to suspend him from football is currently unclear.

As revealed by Insideworldfootball on Wednesday [see related article below], UEFA’s Ethics and Disciplinary Inspector, Miguel Liétard Fernández-Palacios, approved the admission to the Europa League of Asteras Tripolis, whose owner and a board member have also been accused of match-fixing in the Greek Super League.

The matter is currently under consideration by the UEFA Appeals board after it was referred there by the general secretary, Gianni Infantino, and the chairman of UEFA’s Control, Ethics And Disciplinary Committee, Thomas Partl.