Soccer fiddle rumoured
NZPA Kuwait Kuwaiti soccer officials yesterday dropped a bombshell by claiming that Middle East football politics could be the final straw that breaks the back of Australia’s 1978 World Cup challenge. They claimed that if the Soeceroos beat Kuwait today and go on to defeat Iran next Saturday, Kuwait would have nothing to lose by “going easy” against Iran in their match next month.
This could be to ensure that a Middle Eastern nation is represented at next year’s World Cup finals in Argentina, instead of Australia. It is an open secret in Kuwait that Kuwait and Iran, Australia’s main rivals in the Asian qualifying group, do not regard the Soeceroos as suitable representaives of the Asia Oceania zone. So if the Soeceroos beat Kuwait today their World Cup challenge is over. And if the Australians can
storm home and win their last qualifying match in Teheran next week, the whole outcome of the Asian group would rest squarely on Iran doing well in its last match against their Middle Eastern neighbours, Kuwait, in Kuwait City on December 3. Kuwait soccer circles have been buzzing with talk of this scenario. But Kuwaiti authorities have only shrugged and laughed at suggestions of “going easy" against Iran.
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Press, 19 November 1977, Page 60
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208Soccer fiddle rumoured Press, 19 November 1977, Page 60
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