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The day Argentina “incentivized” Poland with “lost” $25,000

2022-11-30T11:09:54.854Z


In Germany 74, the albiceleste needed the Poles to beat Italy to advance to the next round This Wednesday, Argentina needs to beat Poland to reach the round of 16 without depending on other results. Time will tell if the Poles become the executioners of the Argentines in Qatar 2022. History, however, once had them as allies. It is a story with chiaroscuro, denied a thousand times. In Germany 74, Poland and Italy qualified with a tie that left Argentina out. But the match ended with a vi


This Wednesday, Argentina needs to beat Poland to reach the round of 16 without depending on other results.

Time will tell if the Poles become the executioners of the Argentines in Qatar 2022. History, however, once had them as allies.

It is a story with chiaroscuro, denied a thousand times.

In Germany 74, Poland and Italy qualified with a tie that left Argentina out.

But the match ended with a victory for the Poles, the only result that saved the South Americans.

Poland played with all its starters, to kill or be killed.

It was then circulated that Argentina had "incentivized" the Poles with $25,000, a story that was later confirmed by some of its protagonists.

It was never made clear if that money reached the entire team or just one of them, who kept the proceeds of the arrangement.

In Germany 74, Argentina debuted with a 2-3 defeat against the Poles.

They then drew 1-1 with Italy.

To go to the next round, they had to beat Haiti and Italy lose against Poland, which was already classified.

That's where the idea of ​​incentivization was born.

The Argentine journalist Héctor Vega Onesime, sent by the magazine

El Gráfico

, recounted it in his book

Memoirs of a sports journalist.

Vega Onesime attended a press conference with the Polish coach, Kazimierz Gorski, and they promised that they would go out “to win”.

But he did not do so well with Robert Gadocha, forward and figure of the national team: “I went up to greet him without knowing that he was starting one of the most controversial stories in Argentine soccer.

'How are they going to play?', I asked him, but the reply was very different: 'That depends on the Argentines', he intentionally slipped”.

The proposal, veiled, was on the table.

The Argentine journalist called the players from his country and conveyed the message to them.

“There was an offer and an agreement.

Gadocha and Héctor Rial [a member of the Albiceleste coaching staff] were in charge of the transaction.

Poland kept their promise against Italy and Argentina qualified after thrashing Haiti.

I never knew the scope and intimacy of that negotiation or the destination of the money, ”Vega Onesime wrote in his book, published in 2003.

Revealing the rest of the story was the responsibility of a player from that Argentine team, Enrique Wolff, who over the years became a renowned sports journalist.

In the book

Así

jugamos, written by Diego Boronsky, he said that they had managed to raise $25,000 among the entire squad.

“The Poles came to offer and we said 'well,' because if they didn't they were going to play with substitutes and what do I know.

We each pay $1,000.

The funniest thing was that there were guys who didn't have the money to pay for what they wanted to give to Poland and the AFA put it in and then deducted it from the prizes”, revealed Wolff.

Poland finally beat Italy 2-1, who was left out, and as Argentina thrashed the Haitians 4-1 qualified.

The story has a second part.

What happened to the $25,000?

A Polish striker, Grzegorz Lato, told Argentine Rubén Ayala years later, with whom he shared a team in Mexico, that he never found out about the existence of that money.

The defender Wladyslaw Zmuda ratified in his biography

Of him And you will be a footballer

Lato's version and pointed directly against Gadocha.

“We didn't get a penny.

I spoke with Gadocha, who now lives in the United States.

He neither answered nor called.

Not then, not after knowing all this.”

The heirs of those players will face each other again on a playing field almost 50 years later.

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Source: elparis

All sports articles on 2022-11-30

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