Клуб Йойокеров

It's official: According to the Spanish press, Olympique Lyonnais owner Jean-Michel Aulas went to Croatia Wednesday night with a suitcase full of money and came back with a ninth consecutive Champions League knockout-round berth, thanks to his team's 7-1 victory over Dinamo Zagreb.

Reliable sources also report that the Smoking Man from the X-Files was involved, having been seen outside the stadium while Real Madrid did its part to ensure Lyon's improbable goal-differential conquest, defeating Ajax 3-0.

While anything is possible, this has to be one of the most ridiculous sports conspiracy theories in recent memory. First published by Spanish papers AS and Marca minutes after the final whistle and then picked up by a few English-language sources , the theory holds that Aulas somehow fixed both matches so that the French side would be able to overcome the daunting seven-goal lead held by Ajax heading into the final night of Champions League group play.

I'm not naïve. Match-fixing in big-time football certainly runs deeper than we want to believe: money and shadiness are inseparable, and there's a lot of money at stake here. But let's take a look at a few reasons why this doesn't make any sense:

1) Rémi Garde's starting lineup against Dinamo Zagreb was an obvious nod to Lyon's long odds to qualify. With an important domestic match at Lorient on Sunday, the Lyon skipper rested no-brainer starters Lisandro Lopez, Kim Källström, Anthony Réviellière, Michel Bastos and Cris. One reporter covering the match was so disappointed with the starting 11 that he joked about finding an early flight back to Paris after he saw the lineup. If the match were fixed, wouldn't Aulas have wanted his best players on the pitch to ensure that the 'investment' paid off?

2) If you were going to fix a match, would you have your team stink for an entire half, go down a goal to an inferior team and then start scoring at will? Did the money not exchange hands until half time? Did the Croatian coach forget to tell his players to take a dive until the break? That's one inventive match-fixing strategy.

3) Even 7-1 wasn't good enough by itself, which means the the Real Madrid/Ajax match must have been fixed as well. If Jean-Michel Aulas is that powerful, you'd think he could do better than have a team that bows out of Champions League in the quarterfinals nearly every season. There are precious few people in football with that draw that kind of water, and I don't think any of them are in Lyon.