AE Larisa 1987-1988 Home Jersey

15 February 2021 0 Από giakallit

Season: 1987-1988

Player: –

Tournament: Super League Greece, Greek Cup

Manufacturer: Nike

The 1987-1988 season was the biggest surprise in the history of the Greek championship. AEL, three years after winning the Greek Cup in the final against PAOK, won the championship. Thus, Larissa became the only team based outside of Athens and Thessaloniki that won the Greek championship.

Larissa in 30 games had 18 wins, 7 draws and just 5 defeats and finished first with 43 points, 3 more than the second AEK and 4 more than PAOK. Until the 29^th game, the coach of the team was the very successful in Greece Jacek Gmoch, but he was replaced shortly before the end of the championship by Horacio Morales.

Towards the end of the championship, there was a disturbance when in a doping test after the Larissa - Panathinaikos match, the Larissa football player Georgi Tsingov tested positive for the antitussive substance codeine. The result was to punish Larissa by deducting 4 points, a punishment which favored AEK as being 3 points behind it would win the Championship on paper. The decision to punish Larissa provoked a popular uprising in the city of Thessaly with the fans of the local team blocking the national road and the Athens-Thessaloniki railway line, causing a huge transport problem. The solution was given by the Deputy Minister of Sports, Sifis Valyrakis. With his intervention, on 21/3/1988, he changed Article 32 of the Rules of Football Games, which was harmonized with the current legislation of all UEFA member countries, where the team is not responsible and is not punished in case of a doped player. This decision resulted in Tsingov being punished on the one hand, but on the other hand the points were returned to Larissa, which thus won the title.

George Mitsibonas used to wear the number 4 of AEL. Despite being a defender, Mitsibonas scored 8 goals in the 1987-1988 season with the absolute highlight being the beautiful goal against Iraklis in the 29^th fixture which secured the title for Larissa.

Mitsibonas later played for PAOK and Olympiakos to return in 1994 to AEL. On September 13, 1997, however, this much-loved footballer lost his life in a car accident while he was only 34 years old.