The second big international tournament of the year was the Olympic Games. The Olympics always attract big interest, but in the 1980 even more so. First, because Moscow hosted them and the Soviet political ambition to outdo everything done to this moment immediately brought critical comparison to Hitler’s Olympics in 1934. It was to be more than sports – it was to be a showcase of Communist supremacy, aiming to win ideological battle. Politics affected badly the games – the West was not happy to participate in something designed to humiliate democracy. USSR provided a way out, but also politicized the games for the West too. The second point was the Soviet invasion of Afganistan – now now the West had a reason to protest and eventually refuse to participate in the games. The issue became entirely political, accusation flew both ways and no side was satisfied – USA called for boycott , but not every country followed, so to a point the boycott failed. USSR tried to emphasize sporting spirit and accused USA of sabotaging purely friendly event – but few were convinced.
At the end sportsmen from participating countries marched to the opening as ever.
Mummy-like Brezhnev announced the Olympics officially starting.
And the mascot Misha wished success to everybody. All of these were interpreted depending on political standpoint – perhaps the first Olympics burdened with so heavy double meaning.
Football was hardly affected by the confrontation – actually, it was, but 4 years later when the Communist countries retaliated by boycotting the Los Angeles Olympics. In 1980 it was perhaps the sport least suffering by the political stand off: Olympic football lost its importance long time ago, it was considered a domain of Eastern Europe, and the interest in it was small. There were problems with participation, the status of players and whole teams, statistics, and the whole formula for years – they diminished both the importance of Olympic football and public interest in it. Tensions were largely European, for South Americans were not very interested in Olympic football and played by the rules. The rest of the world played by the rules too and easily so, for there was no professional football in Asia and Africa, and very little in North America. Europe was the only battlefield – first of all, not every country bothered with Olympic football. This created problems with qualifications – amateur football was secondary matter at best for most federations. Money were short. This lead to qualification groups based on geography – the Eastern Europe grumbled, because now the Communist countries were grouped together. Teams, better than their Western counterparts were eliminated. ‘Not fair’, cried the East. The West responded by old accusation: that Easterners used their national teams and their players were hardly ‘amateurs’ – unfair advantage over purely amateur Western teams. With time, the whole amateur issue became muddy, because rules differed from one country to the next in the West and it was not the real situation of a given player, but rather what was written on paper making him professional or amateur. Sometimes violations were not even objected by either side of the dispute, because objection would trigger even bigger digging in the backyard of the protester. The main result was fantastic statistical mess – as a rule of thumb, Eastern European countries counted their Olympic matches as matches played by their national team. Western European countries did not do that. But, with time, the Eastern Europeans also started making separate Olympic teams – and this brought even bigger statistical mess, for there were players never appearing for the A team, but still got matches because the Olympic team appeared in official statistics. In 1980 the mess caught the Easterners as well – during the Olympics Soviet journalists complained about the statistic numbers of Czechoslovakian and East German players: they looked fake and it was impossible to figure out on what those numbers were based. Coaches were puzzled and unable to really evaluate the strength of the opposition, journalists had no idea who some players were – the names were unknown, but their records showed otherwise. As for statisticians and historians… the puzzle was unsolvable. What was the legitimate criteria was growing mystery: the official registration showed the number of ‘international matches played’. And here is a sample of East German players: Kuhn – 75 matches, Schnuphase – 69, Liebers – 53, Hause – 51, Terletzki – 50, Trieloff – 46. At the bottom of the list was the 30-years old Netz with 6 matches. Fairly well known player, but with so few caps, unlike his teammates. Those with most matches were national team players, but nobody had so many matches for the A team. Journalists considered that the records showed a grand total of matches played for the A national team, B team, the Olympic team, and all junior formations. And… still the numbers did not tally.
The biggest mystery of all was Rostislav Vaclavicek – 34-years defender of Zbrojovka (Brno), whose registry showed 48 ‘international matches’. But he never played a single game for Czechoslovakia – that is, for the A team. The only conclusion the Soviet journalists came to was that may be Czechoslovakian Federation counted all international matches a player participated in during his career – including unofficial friendlies of the club a player played for. Still, there was no solution… with all his ‘impressive’ international record Vaclavicek was only a reserve. A new suspicion loomed from that: it looked like some teams decided on race for records – and suddenly team USSR appeared inexperienced, for compared to Vaclavicek the Soviet players had nothing to show… their most capped player was Vagiz Khidiatulin with 17 caps. Bessonov followed with 16. But even the Soviet numbers were a mystery… both Khidiatulin and Bessonov were still new to the national team. There numbers showed what? Matches for the A team? The Olympic team? Or combined record? There was no distinction between teams – on July 12, less than a month before the Olympics started, USSR played a friendly against Denmark. The accounts show a match of the A team. Denmark certainly played with their national team. ‘Olympics’ were not even mentioned ones in the articles on the match – just an ordinary friendly of the A national team. Which consisted of the very same squad playing 20 days at the Olympics. Under the same coach too – the other ‘suspect’ finalists at least had different coaches for their A and Olympic teams, a clear sign of separation, of different teams. At least USSR, DDR, and Czechoslovakia officially had ‘amateur’ football – Yugoslavia did not exactly claim that. Players there had ‘contracts’ with their clubs, it was openly spoken of and written about. Who was amateur and who was professional in Yugoslavia then? If Zlatko and Zoran Vujovic, Milos Hrstic, Ivan Gudelj, Dragan Pantelic, Tomislav Ivkovic were still young players and may be without professional contracts, it was unlikely that established for years players like Boro Primorac, Milan Jovin, Milos Sestic were ‘amateurs’ training after work by 1980. Like the entire team USSR, half of the Czechoslovaks, and at least a third of team DDR, the Yugoslavs were current national team players or up and coming youngsters destined to play for the national team. Of course, the role of the Olympic teams was more or less trying future national team players, but there were so many current ones on one hand, and so many not merely promising youngsters, but ready to play for the A team as soon as the Olympic games end. It was a mockery of the whole distinction between national and Olympic teams – and this was not lost on Western countries either, which during the 1970s gradually started using not part-timers, but players already included in professional teams. Lines were blurred, problems increased not only of what was a legitimate amateur, but what is a match of the A national team and what not. To sum the problems: if one looks records today, the already mentioned Rostislav Vaclavicek has 0 matches for Czechoslovakia. Vladimir Bessonov has 79 matches for the national team of USSR and 6 for the Olympic team – separate records, although the Olympic one includes only the matches played at the 1980 Olympic finals, suggesting that the USSR Olympic team played no other games at the time – just the finals. Frank Terletzki has a grand total of 4 matches for DDR – and nothing else, which means that A and Olympic teams were separate entities in DDR even when using the same players. Boro Primorac – 14 for Yugoslavia, started in 1976. Francisco Buyo, the future goalkeeper of Real Madrid, playing for Deportivo La Coruna in 1980, has 11 matches for the amateur national team of Spain – despite the fact that he was ‘loaned’ from La Coruna by Huesca in 1978-79 and played for professional clubs since 1975. And Frantisek Stambachr won Olympic gold less then two months after winning European bronze with the Czechoslovakian A team – yet his record shows only matches played for the A team: 31 between 1977 and 1983. No wonder Western countries called for changing rules and permitting professionals to participate in the Olympic games – by 1980 even the Communist countries had trouble figuring out their own teams and who and what was legitimate amateur. After all, one cannot really oppose the status of, say, Buyo, if counting the preparatory games of his ‘Olympic’ teams as A-national team friendlies. Other factors piled up – just after the Olympics the African Federation officially permitted professional football on the continent: given the resources there, hardly a single African country would have been able to finance two different national teams. The same was true for Asia at that time and most of Central America as well – the International Olympic Committee wanted vast participation in the games, so it was clear that unless rules were changed, fake and corrupted records would flood Olympic football and tensions, scandals, and never ending mutual accusations, followed by boycotts may even kill the Olympic games.