Bernard Tapie - The Man Who Built and Destroyed Marseille
Bernard Tapie is one of the most controversial figures in French football history and that reasoning makes a lot of sense. While he was the leading figure in the project that led Olympique Marseille to win the 1993 UEFA Champions League, the truth of the matter is that success was tainted. There were several cases of corruption and match-fixing during Tapie's stint as the club's owner.
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This is the story of Bernard Tapie as Marseille's president and their respective rise and fall.
The Context
Tapie bought Olympique Marseille when the club was struggling mightily when it came to performances on the pitch and finances. Perhaps the most interesting element of this situation is that Tapie wasn't interested in Marseille and football as a whole but persuaded by then-city mayor Gaston Defferre, he decided to buy the declining club.This business tycoon had made a fortune taking over ailing companies and bringing them back to the upper echelons of their respective industries. Furthermore, Tapie already had success in sports with a French cycling team known as La Vie Claire, so by the time he took over Marseille in 1986, the man already knew had to develop struggling properties.
The mission statement was very clear: to create a football squad that could win the European Cup (which was the name for UEFA Champions League back then). Despite having a long history and influence in the sport, France never had a club that could win the continent's most coveted trophy at that level, so it seemed like an uphill battle. After all, Marseille were struggling in the mid-80s and French football has always been known for selling talent rather than signing it, which is something that, at first, would play against Tapie's favor.
However, the man had some cards up his sleeve.
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Jean-Pierre Papin (here while playing for AC Milan) joined Marseille during Bernard Tapie's time
Star-studded Squads and European Insanity
While Bernard Tapie took over the club in 1986, it took until 1988 for the club to win the league for the first time during his reign. However, it would be the club's first league title in 17 years, and it was spearheaded by some of Tapie's most prominent signings until that moment, such as Jean-Pierre Papin, Karlheinz Forster and Klaus Allofs.He was one of the first millionaires to really inject money into a club that sign a lot of prominent players and the summer of 1989, in order to challenge for the European Cup, was perhaps the watershed moment. Tapie went all out and signed some of the best talented players in Europe at the time, such as Didier Deschamps, Enzo Francescoli and Chris Waddle, helping them win another league title.
In fact, the club reached the semifinals of the European Cup that season but lost to Benfica due to a goal the player had scored with his hands. That was long before the times of VAR, so the goal counted but Tapie was enraged, swearing "That will not happen to us again."
In 1991, however, the club reached the European Cup final against Yugoslavia's Red Star Belgrade, only to lose in what was perhaps one of the biggest upsets in football history. It was during this time period that Marseille were already involved in some controversies that didn't come out to the surface, but Tapie was only prompted to do even more damage after such a frustrating affair in the final.
Tainted Success
Olympique Marseille won the league from 1988 to 1993 in a row and eventually won the first edition of the UEFA Champions League in 1993 against an amazing AC Milan side coached by Fabio Capello. They were finally the first-ever French club to win the competition, regardless of format, but their success would end up having one of the most tainted legacies in modern football.In March 1993, Marseille had eliminated CSKA Moscow in the UEFA Champions League but the latter's manager, Gennady Kostylev, admitted on an interview in Russia that they had been bribed by officials of the French club.
"I received a telephone call at our team hotel in Marseille," he said, "from a person claiming to be a Marseille director, offering money to lose the match."
There were many examples of this over the years, with the club pressuring and threatening rivals in order to give in and surrender the matches. There were also cases of doping, with several Marseille players consuming illegal substances in order to improve their performances, which was a combination of events that eventually had consequences in February of 1994.
The club was found guilty of match-fixing and several other crimes, which led to them being relegated to the second division of French football. Furthermore, some of their trophies were removed from their cabinet and Bernard Tapie was eventually sent to prison for several crimes, including those during his time as a politician.
Aftermath and Conclusion
It is fair to say that Bernard Tapie is an infamous figure in the world of French football. He marked an early precedent of businessmen adding money to football clubs, which would eventually become the norm in the sport, and helped Marseille reach a higher level, although that came with a lot of cheating and manipulation.It is one of the darkest episodes in the history of French football and one of the most controversial figures in the country's sport.