Gijón Non-Aggression Pact

As a non-aggression pact of Gijon , even shame of Gijon , which is soccer match between the German and the Austrian national team at the 1982 FIFA World Cup in Spain called. The game took place on June 25, 1982 in Gijón and ended 1-0 for the Federal Republic of Germany.

The game became notorious because the early German leadership allowed both teams to advance to the next round and the game was brought to an end without any serious attacking efforts. Despite two victories, the Algeria team had to retire , whose last preliminary round match had already taken place the day before and whose final result was known to both teams. As a consequence of this refusal to perform, the last two preliminary round matches of a group have been played in major tournaments at the same time.

Starting position

The European champions Germany lost their opening game at the 1982 World Cup with 1: 2 against Algeria, but a 4: 1 against Chile retained their chances of one of the first two places in Group 2 . Austria won their first two games, but had not yet secured progress.

The penultimate group match between Algeria and Chile had already ended 3-2 for Algeria, making Algeria the first African team to ever win against a South American team. Before the start of the game, the table status according to the two-point rule applied at the time was as follows:

Pl.	country	Sp.	S.	U	N	Gates	Diff.	Points
1.	Austria	2	2	0	0	003-000	+3	04-00
2.	Algeria	3	2	0	1	005: 500	± 0	04: 20
3.	BR Germany	2	1	0	1	005: 300	+2	02: 20
4th	Chile	3	0	0	3	003: 800	−5	00: 60

As usual, the table was sorted first by points, then by goal difference and then by the number of goals scored. The two first placed came into the next round. In the new edition of the legendary game in Córdoba in 1978 , Germany had to win in order to progress; Austria was allowed to lose with a maximum of two goals difference, from three own goals with a maximum of three goals difference.

Game details

BR Germany		Austria
	3rd day of the preliminary round Friday 25 June 1982 at 5:15 p.m. in Gijón ( El Molinón ) Result: 1: 0 (1: 0) Spectators: 41,000 Referee: Robert Valentine ( Scotland )   Match report
	Toni Schumacher - Uli Stielike - Manfred Kaltz , Karlheinz Förster , Hans-Peter Briegel - Karl-Heinz Rummenigge (66th Lothar Matthäus ), Wolfgang Dremmler , Paul Breitner , Felix Magath - Horst Hrubesch (68th Klaus Fischer ), Pierre Littbarski Trainers: Jupp Derwall	Friedrich Koncilia - Erich Obermayer - Bernd Krauss , Bruno Pezzey , Josef Degeorgi - Roland Hattenberger , Heribert Weber , Herbert Prohaska , Reinhold Hintermaier - Walter Schachner , Hans Krankl Trainer: Georg Schmidt
	1: 0 Hrubesch (11.)
		Hintermaier (32nd), Schachner (32nd)

Course of the game

Germany got off to a powerful start and quickly developed scoring opportunities. In the 11th minute, Horst Hrubesch scored the leading goal for Germany after a cross from Littbarski. With this intermediate result the following table resulted:

Pl.	country	Sp.	S.	U	N	Gates	Diff.	Points
1.	BR Germany	3	2	0	1	006: 300	+3	04: 20
2.	Austria	3	2	0	1	003: 100	+2	04: 20
3.	Algeria	3	2	0	1	005: 500	± 0	04: 20
4th	Chile	3	0	0	3	003: 800	−5	00: 60

Austria and Germany would have reached the intermediate round at this stage.

After the goal, Germany initially pressed further and developed more scoring opportunities; so there were five more corners for Germany. Defensive players such as Stielike, Karlheinz Förster and Hans-Peter Briegel, who had advanced far up, also took part in the attacks. Austria tried to equalize by counterattack. Towards the end of the first half, however, the game flattened and it was evident that both teams wanted to avoid any risk of conceding a goal. Since the back pass rule did not yet exist in 1982 and the goalkeeper was allowed to pick up balls with his hand that were passed to him by his own field player, the following course of the game resulted: The team in possession played the ball in their own half of the game until an opposing player came close to the player in possession of the ball. Immediately afterwards, the ball was passed back to its own goalkeeper. Occasionally, long balls were played into the opposing half, but did not reach their own teammates there because they acted very withdrawn. There were no more serious shots on goal from either team, especially in the second half, and there were almost no tackles. The only player on the pitch who tried to play forward was the Austrian Walter Schachner , but without success. Obviously there was a tacit agreement not to change the mutually beneficial outcome ( game theory a " win-win situation ").

Reactions

The ARD commentator Eberhard Stanjek expressed his outrage about the behavior of both teams from the second half. He spoke of a "shame". On Austrian television, commentator Robert Seeger (as a unique event in Austrian sports and television history ) asked viewers to switch off their television sets in the second half. The Spanish audience (41,000 visitors) waved white towels for almost the entire second half. This is a common practice in Spanish stadiums to express displeasure. A Spanish newspaper then referred to the game as "El Anschluss ". The Algerians felt cheated about their entry into the next round and waved money, which the then defense chief Karlheinz Förster commented: “I understand a bit for the expressions of displeasure by the Algerian fans because it looked like it had been agreed. You couldn't watch the game in the middle of the second half. That was a non-aggression pact. "

The players commented on the event in different ways: Paul Breitner , who was on the pitch for Germany at the time, said in a ZDF program in 2006 that the behavior at that time was not reprehensible, after all, every team would at some point begin to “manage” a result. The German and Austrian teams would just have started earlier than normal. The Austrian Walter Schachner later claimed that during the half-time break, some German and Austrian players had agreed to keep it 1-0 for Germany. He himself was not informed about this and therefore continued to try to score. He only found out about the agreement after the game. For Austrian goalkeeper Friedl Koncilia , who loudly accused his teammates of being just before falling asleep while the match was still on, the result was the result of a constellation that was favorable for both teams and did not require consultation. The Austrian head of the delegation, Hans Tschak, caused further outrage after the game, commenting on the expressions of displeasure by the Algerian audience as follows:

“Of course we played tactically today. But if that's why 10,000 desert sons want to spark a scandal in the stadium, it only shows that they have too few schools. A sheikh like that comes from an oasis, is allowed to sniff the World Cup air after 300 years and believes that he can now open the door. "

- Hans Tschak

Hans Krankl commented on the result as follows: “I don't know what you want. We are qualified. "

35 years after the game, Reinhold Hintermaier conceded in kicker : “Usually you are happy when you progress, but there was no joy. You were a bit surprised and ashamed that you did that - that you participated. Everyone was aware that this story was no fame sheet for us. "

Consequences

The immediate consequence of this game was that since the European Championship in 1984 the last games of a group in every international tournament have always taken place simultaneously. Although similar constellations as in Gijón are still conceivable in this mode, they are much less likely.

The direct comparison introduced later by UEFA also enables match-fixing on the last day of the match, for example in the Euro 2004 match between Denmark and Sweden .

Limiting passive or timed play was also one of the reasons for the introduction of the back pass rule by FIFA in 1992.

Similar cases at world championships

During the 2010 World Cup in South Africa, the teams of Spain and Chile behaved in the last ten minutes of their group game with a 2: 1 similar to Germany and Austria in 1982. Some newspapers spoke of a “non-aggression pact”.

At the 2014 World Cup in Brazil, on the other hand, there was a situation before the last group game between Germany and the USA that a draw would guarantee both teams progress, which led to comparisons with Gijón in German media before the game, especially since the USA was defeated by Löw's predecessor Klinsmann were trained. Germany won the game 1-0, while their opponents USA qualified for the round of 16 due to the better goal difference against Portugal .

At the following World Cup in 2018 , France and Denmark met on the last day of the group, with France (which had already qualified for the next round) to win the group and Denmark still needed a draw to advance safely. Since neither wanted to risk much anymore, it became a game with little tempo and little chance with the final score 0: 0, whereby some media drew comparisons with the "Shame of Gijon". Due to Peru's victory against Australia in the parallel group game, Denmark would have reached the round of 16 even if they had lost.

More cases

On the final day of the English Football League First Division 1976/77 were Sunderland , Bristol and Coventry (all on points) in danger of relegation. The games took place with a time delay of five minutes. After it was a tie between Coventry and Bristol and it was learned that Sunderland had lost, Bristol and Coventry "agreed" to move the ball back and forth without motivation and thus prevent relegation.

A comparable constellation occurred during the U-21 European Football Championship in 2015 to the disadvantage of Italy in the last group match between Sweden and Portugal. Both Portugal and Sweden were able to reach the next round with a draw, whereby a defeat for Sweden would have meant the tournament. After the Swedes equalized in the 89th minute, no team attacked, the Portuguese only pushed the ball back and forth in the three-minute stoppage time.

At the next U-21 European Championship in 2017 , Italy and Germany played against each other on the last day of the preliminary round, with Italy winning 1-0 and becoming group winners. Germany reached the semi-finals as the best runner-up in the group. With any other result, the Slovak team would have been the best runner-up in the group and either Germany or Italy would have been eliminated. This created a win-win situation and neither team undertook any further noteworthy offensive actions from around five minutes before the end of the game and especially in stoppage time.

Web links

• Soccer World Cup scandals: Gijón 1982 non-aggression pact on YouTube
• Final phase and game analysis for the “Shame of Gijón” (June 25, 1982) on YouTube
• dfb.de: "Victory against Austria: No reason to be happy"

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Die Schande von Gijón Stern.de, June 23, 2014, accessed on May 18, 2015.
2. ↑ einestages.spiegel.de: " The most boring World Cup game of all time ."
3. ^ Ulrich Hesse-Lichtenberger: Goal! The Story of German Football. WSC Books 2003, ISBN 0-9540134-5-X , p. 249.
4. ↑ 25 years ago: The Shame of Gijon. (No longer available online.) Sport Bild website , archived from the original on June 13, 2008 ; Retrieved June 25, 2014 . 
5. ↑ cf. an article in the standard with reference to the APA ( Walter Schachner "was ang'fressen" )
6. ↑ Focus.de: Trouble because of the "non-aggression pact" .
7. ↑ Eduard Augustin u. a .: Our football. Goldmann, 2010, p. 121.
8. ↑ Manfred Münchrath: "Let's rock this home." In: kicker sports magazine . June 19, 2017, page 86/87.
9. ↑ Euro 2004: Sweden v Denmark - they said it would not end 2-2… but it did , Guardian article from June 18, 2012 (English)
10. ↑ Return pass rule in football: That's what it says. Retrieved April 9, 2020 . 
11. ^ World Cup 2010: Spain survive - and steer clear of Brazil. The Guardian , June 26, 2010, accessed June 23, 2014 . 
12. ↑ 0: 0 would be enough: Portugal fears German-American World Cup non-aggression pact . In: Focus Online . June 23, 2014.
13. ↑ Screaming whistles from the fans: France's 0-0 win against Denmark is reminiscent of the “Shame of Gijon”. mobil.stern.de, June 26, 2018, accessed June 16, 2019 . 
14. ↑ Football: Coventry perform escape act once again . In: The Independent .
15. ↑ Jannik Sorgatz: U21: Portugal and Sweden fit Italy out of the EM . In: RP Online .
16. ↑ Hapal insults German U21s: “A shame” - Slovak coach demands consequences. Kicker-Sportmagazin , June 25, 2017, accessed on June 25, 2017 .