For the second time in a row, the Stoiximan Super League vote ended in a tie, with the two candidates for the presidency, Vangelis Marinakis and Giannis Alafouzos, each receiving seven votes. The vote will be held again at noon on Wednesday (July 15, 3:30 p.m.).
After the voting process concluded, Olympiacos’s power broker took a stand against Makis Gagatsis and also put forward a proposal to resolve the voting issue.
Vangelis Marinakis proposed as president a person he considers to be a consensus candidate, naming Ms. Koxenoglou, considering the Atromitos representative to be the right person to take on this role.
Here is what Vangelis Marinakis said in detail:
In his initial statement, Vangelis Marinakis lashed out at the Hellenic Football Federation (EPO) and Makis Gagatsis, saying that he had tried to influence clubs to change their vote.
“We’ll see it all from here on out—including the pressure the EPO President himself exerted through text messages and other means. We’ll also look at what promises and inducements were made to other teams and how the owners were pressured—again, through text messages and other means! And we’ll examine all of this in detail later. “We agreed not to mix soccer with politics, but once again there was political pressure,” the owner of the Piraeus club also noted.
From the very beginning of my term as Super League President, I’ve made it clear that I want what’s best for all the teams. With the major sponsorship deal we secured—which made the Super League’s operations sustainable—and through our efforts toward joint television rights management. We managed to secure very good television contracts for all the teams for four years, so that they wouldn’t need Marinakis, Alafouzos, or Savvidis.
And since being president of the Super League doesn’t change anything in my daily life, nor does it help my team in any way, in order to defuse the situation and for the good of soccer, I am telling you that I agree to have a mutually acceptable candidate, such as Vice President Ms. Koxenoglou, who has proven herself capable and experienced in matters related to the cooperative.”
*photo source: AP