Raczkowski: “I can’t believe what happened was a prepared provocation”

Polish referee Pawel Raczkowski officiated the match between AEK and Aris for the Stoiximan Super League playoffs. However, this did not happen.

On the one hand, there were complaints that they were seen drunk on the plane and caused an incident with fellow Greek passengers, while the referee, through a statement distributed to Polish media, called the reports against him and the rest of the referee team fake news.

In an interview that he gave to a Polish website, he described what happened during the flight up to the departure from Greece from his point of view.

Raczkowski’s statements:

“There were no discussions about the game with Lech and the Olympiakos president, I don’t even know his name. On flights like this, everyone takes care of themselves, things that there is no time for during the weekday. Discussions about what happened last week don’t come to mind.

After all this time, why would I think about a game that’s already been made? I focused on the next one. I was also reading a book, trying to watch a movie and realized one of my headphones fell off. At 3/4 of the flight the flight attendant and I were trying to get her out between the seats. I can’t believe what happened was a deliberate provocation.

After landing we got our luggage from the porters. Out of nowhere we were attacked by two people. They called us corrupt swine. We are Panathinaikos, we know what you did in Poznań, you will not whistle tomorrow, we will destroy you. Tomorrow everything will be in the media”.

At first I took them as a sign of the stupid behavior of a drunk passenger. I was waiting for my friend in economy class. The fan kept swearing at me and spitting in my face.

I was left alone, no one helped me. Aristotelis Diamantopoulos, our escort, made sure I did nothing to report the matter to the police. The next day he became the first referee. The President of KED informed us that we were recalled due to the clubs not agreeing to whistle.

I replied that it was a joke. I called the main referees in Poland. When I came back, the KED President was gone. We haven’t seen him yet. On Sunday, after the interview, he reported to the police and I asked for a breathalyzer test.

Apparently the Panathinaikos fans found the driver who picked us up from the airport and wanted to know where we were staying. Then the police parked in front of our hotel. When we were shooting in Poland, we also had an escort.”