Greeks were not to be outdone by some Turks and they had more intricate story in 1976: not a single trophy went to Athens. Thessaloniki ruled Greek football this season and layers of rivalries, hatreds, and meanings played a role. Difficult to entangle too – if Trabzonspor enjoyed unconditional support at home and probably some sympathy among provincials hating Istanbul, the Greek scenario was immensely complicated. PAOK won the championship, leaving AEK (Athens) 5 points behind. The champions had everything: most wins (21 out of 30 games); least losses (only 2); best attack (60 goals); best defense (17 goals received). The season was entirely theirs. Meantime Iraklis won the Cup, so the season entirely belonged to Thessaloniki. Pride, revenge, rivalry, envy… a whole mixed bag, slowly stewing for years: Thessaloniki is the second largest city in Greece, having old clubs traditionally belonging to the ‘big five Greek clubs’, yet, so far they played second fiddle at best. Too many ‘firsts’ happened for comfort…
PAOK won their first title. By mid-70s it was the most popular club in Thessaloniki and pretty much the strongest one, but… it was the youngest club of the city and not entirely local. To a point, it was ‘exiled club’, founded in 1926 by refugees expelled from Turkey. Hence the name: ‘Panthessalonikian Athletic Club of Constantinopolitans’. It was also a mirror of the similar club established in Athens – AEK – but, given time, the clubs of the exiles were not to be great friends. PAOK had its roots back in Istanbul (always Constantinople for the Greeks), going back to 1875 when Hermes Sports Club was formed – ancient pride, yet not a local one… although militant nationalism sees in such club an opportunity to claim – or mourn – lost belongings, ‘rightfully ours’ ( Constantinople). With time PAOK became popular and gained strength, this time adding a new appeal: the all too familiar provincial hatred of the capital city. PAOK performed well, yet never able to win a trophy – the ‘corrupt’ Athenian clubs got everything, boo them! During the 1960s PAOK supporters became known for their anti-junta feelings, so the myth of resisting the military dictatorship was built – the myth of oppressed club by the state. Ironically, in the later years PAOK fans evolved into hooliganism and violence, so may be the junta has been right to suppress them… but never mind, at least at home PAOK claims 38% of the total fans pool. This guys want trophies, mere whining and myths of oppression are not sufficient. And here it came: the very first title! What a boost! Revenge on Athens, revenge on local rivals, revenge on the Turks even, prove of another sensitive issue – ‘Macedonia is Greek’… long suffering in the shades ended.

Black and white pride. Champions at last, although the team was not exactly full of stars.
Two intriguing foreigners – the goalkeeper Bladen Fortula came from Yugoslavia. Curiously anonymous player with strange name: most likely a Kosovar, which may have been (or not) the reason of his virtual anonymity. Whatever is known about him is that he came to Greece from Partizan (Belgrade). Most likely deep reserve there. He joined smaller club at first and eventually moved to PAOK and a title. The other foreigner was equally obscure:
Guerino Neto (the Greeks almost always write him in reverse – Neto Guerino) was one of the many South Americans playing in Greece during the 1970s. The striker came from Brazil with no name at all – even the PAOK official website is unable to give information where he played before joining PAOK. Well, he played in Brazil (naturally) for Nacional (Manaus).

Nacional (Manaus) 1973: top, left to right: Procopio, Flavio, Souza, Tiao, Toninho Cerezo, Pompeu.
Bottom: GUERINO NETO, Serginho, China, Angelo, Reis.
No wonder Guerino Neto’s past is difficult to unearth: Manaus may be a big city, having the first opera house in South America, but is midget in football. And if Nacional had somebody to be proud of, it was not Guerino Neto, but Toninho Cerezo (Brazil’82, AS Roma, Sampdoria). However, fame was years away from either player in 1973. Eventually Guerino Neto left the jungles to themselves, Teatro Amazonas to Werner Herzog (to use it in ‘Fitzcarraldo’), and world fame to Toninho Cerezo. He became a Greek hero – one of the little known South Americans who settled well in Greece, played successfully for years, helping the development of Greek football, and beloved by the fans. Unlike Fortula, Guerino Neto was revered as a real star and contributed a lot. He was a central figure of the winning PAOK along with

Giorgos Koudas, a fast left winger and Greek national team player. Perhaps the biggest star PAOK ever had, a real club legend, and the picture shows amply why. The only thing casting doubt was the depth of the winning squad – Fortula, Guerino Neto, and Koudas were hardly enough for consistent success. But who cares when title is won? First ever! Next year – the second!

Koudas celebrating flamboyantly with the fans the title. The cop is happy too… all Thessaloniki happy. May be…

Trabzonspor won the Turkish championship and took a revenge on Galatasaray, by beating them at the Supercup challenge. It was so strange, that most observers considered the victory of the unknown just a freak. Nobody outside Istanbul ever won a title, if the status quo was to be disturbed, the possible candidates were other Istanbul clubs or someone from Ankara or Izmir. Surely these boys from the Black Sea coast were not to be taken seriously…
Trabzonspor were new club in every respect – founded in 1967 in the ancient city of Trebizond, or Trapezus, or Trapezounta, Trabzon in Turkish. History apart, it was hardly a city coming to mind by the 1960s – even tourists did not flock there yet. The birth of the new club was difficult one: a merger of 4 local clubs, which went into two stages with lawsuit in between, which nullified the first merger and the concocted new club. Not exactly a beginning suggesting glory days ahead. As for the name, it was rather typical for Turkish club: the name of the city with additional ‘spor’ – the corrupted Turkish version of ‘sport’ – at the end. Trabzon Sport Club, in other words (‘club’ is present in the full name – again in the Turkish version: ‘kulubu’ – but hardly ever mentioned). The new club started in the lower levels, as newcomers should, so nothing to brag about at first. But they steadily climbed up and got promoted to First Division in 1974. Normally, a club of such brief and shaky history, goes down quickly – may be a season or two desperately trying to survive, and then the plunge down almost in free fall to debts unknown… Trabzonspor finished 9th in their first season, midtable, but still in the lower half of the league, which was pretty much the normal scenario – now the plummeting was coming… Instead, Trabzonspor finished first in their only second season! Three points ahead of the second best, Fenerbahce; winning 17 out of 30 championship matches and losing only 4. They also had the best defense, allowing only 14 goals. What a surprise! The first provincial champion!


Top: Tuncay, Huseyin, Necati, Bekir, Senol, Cemil
Bottom: Kadir, Turgay, Ali Kemal, Mehmet Cemil, Ali Yavuz
Just by the look of them, one can tell there was quality: remember, the longest the hairs, the better the players in the 1970s! Trabzonspor were more bearded and more long-haired than Galatasaray, so clearly the better team! As for names – one has to look years ahead perhaps… remember the coach leading Turkey to bronze at the 2002 World Cup? Senol Gunes? Here he is – the goalkeeper of the new champions. The two greatest Turkish coaches clashed in 1976 and Senol got the upper hand… which in a way is true for their coaching credentials as well. But the future was unknown in 1976, and Trabzonspor were considered just to be one-time wonder by observers. A freak accident, then everything going back to normal… how wrong observers were… Trabzonspor was there to stay and win. 1976 was just the beginning and especially remarkable beginning: barely 10-years old club was already a champion. If anything, it was a sign of general improvement of Turkish football: new and provincial club was challenging the monopoly of the big old Istanbul clubs. However slowly, something is happening; something positive was happening. It is hardly incidental that the best Turkish coaches came from the best teams of 1976. It may have been unknowable in 1976, but Trabzonspor are still among the best Turkish clubs, ranking among the big 4 clubs, and recently coached by… yes, Senol Gunes.

Changes in football are always baffling – what does it mean to have brand new winners? A sign of improving or a sign of a crisis? Is it a sign of significant reshaping or just occasional lucky event? There were many new winners around Europe in 1976, that much was obvious, and nothing else. It was relatively simple case in championships without few traditional favorites – new champion was nothing new really. But when newcomers pile up? Norway, Sweden – fine; now go South and add some more names, noting that Turkey and Greece were different than Scandinavians: they were dominated by few big clubs.
Turkish football was getting better, yet barely so far to play any role in Europe. Since the national league was established in the late 1950s Turkish football was largely based in three cities – Istanbul, Ankara, and Izmir. For years only clubs representing this three cities played in the league, which at one point had 22 clubs, but by 1975 was stabilized at 16. By the end of the 1960s provincial clubs started creeping in and disturbing the monopoly of the three cities. So far the ‘outsiders’ fought for mere survival in the league, but after 1970 some managed to settled and even gained strength – particularly Bursaspor and Boluspor. But that was fighting among the leagues rabble, for at the very top nothing changed at all – it was dominated by the big three Istanbul clubs: Galatasaray, Fenerbahce, and Besiktas. No other club ever won the championship and no matter how many clubs from Ankara and Izmir played top league football, they were just fillers. Because of the monopoly of the three giants changes were hardly noticeable – until 1975-76.
Galatasaray won the Cup and nothing strange in that, except it was difficult win, after two legged final, crowned by penalty shoot-out, when Galatasaray clinched the victory 5:4.

Top, left to right: Gokmen Yozdenak, Sevki Senlen, Mehmet Ozgul, Enver Urekli, Olcay Baserir, Yasin Ozdenak.
Bottom: Bulent Under, Fatih Terim, Mehmet Oguz, Olcay Basarir (?), Metin Kurt.
A powerhouse by Turkish standards, full of national team players, and having two players worth mentioning: Yasin, who joined Pele and Co in Cosmos (New York) and was known under the name of Erol Yasin, and Fatih Terim, who hardly needs introduction. Everybody knows the coach… hardly anybody knew the player outside Turkey.
Strong as they were, Galatasaray won the Cup with great difficulty – therefore, they met one of their rivals at the final, right? Fenerbahce or Besiktas. It was not so: the stubborn opponent was one Trabzonspor. The unknown club lost the Cup – but nothing else.

1976 was a year of changes around Europe – surprising winners, suggesting reshaping and challenging the status quo. Either this, or suggesting decline… Sweden, the best Scandinavian country, introduced change as well. The Cup went to Stockholm.
AIK triumphed and just as well, for the old club did not win anything since 1950.
Top, left to right: Lars-Oscar Nilsson - coach, Sven Dahlqvist, Jan-Olof Wallgren, Per-Arne Wahlstedt, Bo-Lennart Jepson, Stefan Lundin, Göran Göransson, Christer Andersson, Yngve Leback, Schramm - administrator.
Bpttom: Manni Thofte, Tommy Lundh, Rolf Zetterlund, Leif Karlsson, Claes Marklund, Göran Falck - masseur.
Typical Swedish team – hardly a single recognizable name.
New champions, even less known than the Cup winners, came along too – Halmstads BK.
Founded in 1914, the club from the relatively small town of Halmstad had no trophy to display so far. First title is always big news, even in a country where champions changed frequently.
Just like the Cup winners, the new champions had no stars and little attention was paid to them outside home. They did not look like a team on the road to greatness – skeptics probably detected weakening of Swedish football instead of improving. Numbers suggested so: the championship was littered with ties. Goals were scarce. The dominant club of the 70s – Malmo FF – was defensively minded this year: they lost only 3 matches, receiving 21 goals in 24 championship games. Malmo FF finished second. The Cup winners – AIK – were kings of ties: 13 matches, precisely every second championship game of theirs was tied. The heroes of few years ago – Atvidabergs FF – finished second to last and departed First Division football. Halmstads BK look different in this environment: they obviously an attacking team. They scored the most goals in the league – 56. They also finished with most wins – 17 – the only club with more than 50% of the championship games won! The next best total was 12 wins, so the difference was huge. Nevertheless, there was little to be optimistic about. It was just good to have a small club beating everybody else.

More mighty names? A quick jump to Northern Ireland – Crusaders raided the championship.
And crusaders they were somewhat – the club from Dublin won their second title. If they were to play against Aris, surely they were to take the head of the Greek God… alas, there was no way such clash of ancients to happen in the European tournaments.

If anything, it was brave enough to play football in Northern Ireland of the 1970s. And even braver to have ‘provocative’ name – ‘Crusaders’ sounds dangerously Catholic… This is just about everything for the champions. At the bottom of European football nothing great was happening, so let’s go up the scale.

Luxembourg keeps scandalous events for banking and investment schemes – the football is sparkling clean… and miserable. Unless one supports the giants of the local game.

They are Jeunesse d’Esch, of course. A double this year – 15th championship title and 7th Cup. Not bad? Many a club can envy such a record.

Thanks to the overall supremacy of Jeunesse, the Cup finalists were to appear in the European Cup Winners Cup – a brief appearance on the ‘big field’, but appearance nevertheless. The happy boys display ferocious name – Aris, the ancient Greek god of war. The name was good enough for a close fight at the Cup final – they lost only 1-2 – but outside Luxembourg the club scared nobody…

The name helped little in the long run – the club is not existing since 2001.

If Tom Lund was the highest point of ‘lowly’ football, the rest of the achievements down there hardly ever get international attention. Local records, yes… some curious trivia too… yet even scandals hardly cross national borders. In Malta Sliema Wanderers won their 21st title – massive number by mid-70s, but… Maltese number.
The Cup was won by Floriana.
Floriana was leading confidently 2-0 against Valletta at the final until 86th minute. Then the match was abandoned and the Cup awarded to Floriana. A scandal? Not big enough to ruffle the winners or to interest anybody neither then, nor now.