Olympiacos v Villa Pre-match Thread

[Demitri_C]

We could offer the ref a couple of tickets into the Lower Grounds - over to you Mr. Heck

I reckon we should offer him tickets to dr xias theme park

[sid1964]

just watched UTV podcast - where Luke is walking around their stadium - Hoping that we can do this, it would be fantastic if we could.

Heart says 0-3 to the VILLA

Unfortunately my head is telling me that we are going to be disappointed.

[Dogtanian]

They have nothing to lose. If we get the first goal, suddenly it will look in the balance.

Do or do not. There is no try.

[Richard E]

just watched UTV podcast - where Luke is walking around their stadium - Hoping that we can do this, it would be fantastic if we could.

Heart says 0-3 to the VILLA

Unfortunately my head is telling me that we are going to be disappointed.

Listen to your heart, as Roxette would say.

[TonyD]

Any vids of our fans signing in the sun yet?

[Somniloquism]

That’s funny. I hope you wouldn’t follow the same logic with some other criminal behaviour.

Well criminal?? Want to tell me where the crime was?

But he also served his time, and has not been hinted at for being "bent", "corrupt" or whatever other word you want to use in the last 20 years, apart from tweets from Bellingham and some on here, especially as you would have expected he would be scrutinised more.

No, he didn’t get a criminal conviction - but he took the bribe - that money came from a Croatian gambling syndicate.
You don’t think he’s scrutinised in almost every game now? A quick news search suggests otherwise.

I'm talking about the German Federation, the refs and UEFA scrutinising every decision made for obvious dishonesty, not fans going he cheated once 20 year ago so is now a nine bob note.

And for him, the money came from the ref in the middle.

[Drummond]

Any vids of our fans signing in the sun yet?

[VillaTim]

We could offer the ref a couple of tickets into the Lower Grounds - over to you Mr. Heck

I reckon we should offer him tickets to dr xias theme park

Recon Towers

[pablo_picasso]

It doesn't bother me really. If they wanted a dodgy ref they could have bought one with a spotless record, rather than one who has probably been under scrutiny now for most of his career.

I don't know the ins and outs of it, but from what I've read it seems like he was a young and inexperienced lad who was given cash to not kick up a fuss, and later realised the implications of it.

How many of us haven't had a situation at work as a youngster where you've gone along with or not argued with something that you felt wasn't right, but all the senior and more experienced people just cracked on with?

He’s a bent referee. He shouldn’t be anywhere near professional football.

That is my view too.

Any referee that is caught being bent should be banned for fucking life...

[Demitri_C]

I hope unai will keep his cards close to his chest about who is available to keep olympiakos on their toes

[tomd2103]

Because there is nothing to contest.

UEFA Secretary with direct links to Olympiacos

Corrupt referee appointed

You don't see this reeks of a set up?

No.

The officiating in the 1st leg was contentious to say the least and I'm fearing worse will come tomorrow night.  When you read about Olympiacos’s history of match fixing and bribing officials, it starts to look questionable. 

We obviously didn't know we would play them at that point, but I remember thinking at the time that their results against Maccabi Haifa was suspicious.  Lose 1-4 at home, but then win 1-6 away a week later?

[Richard E]

Surely if it was a set up we would have had the same crap ref in both legs?

[john2710]

All the refs we've seen in the euopean games have been somewhere on the scale of bad to attrocious. The one last week wasn't the worst we've had & he did give us a penalty, but only after he'd disallowed a perfectly good goal & not given an obvious penalty for a foul on Bailey.

Usually over the number of games we've played you'd expect things to even themselves out, but I can't think of a single decision that's gone our way. Personally, I think it's a bias against Premier League clubs.

[VillaTim]

All the refs we've seen in the euopean games have been somewhere on the scale of bad to attrocious. The one last week wasn't the worst we've had & he did give us a penalty, but only after he'd disallowed a perfectly good goal & not given an obvious penalty for a foul on Bailey.

Usually over the number of games we've played you'd expect things to even themselves out, but I can't think of a single decision that's gone our way. Personally, I think it's a bias against Premier League clubs.

Bailey played for that . I've seen them given but it was never a pen .

[martin o`who??]

With regard to the options for the
Poll - the "Villa get completely fucked over by dodgy Referee" option is a glaring omission.