Alexandre Villaplane (24 December 1904 – 27 December 1944) was a French

football Football is a family of team sports that involve, to varying degrees, kicking a ball to score a goal. Unqualified, the word ''football'' normally means the form of football that is the most popular where the word is used. Sports commonly c ...

player who played as a

midfielder A midfielder is an outfield position in association football. Midfielders may play an exclusively defensive role, breaking up attacks, and are in that case known as defensive midfielders. As central midfielders often go across boundarie ...

. He played for France at the

1928 Summer Olympics The 1928 Summer Olympics ( nl, Olympische Zomerspelen 1928), officially known as the Games of the IX Olympiad ( nl, Spelen van de IXe Olympiade) and commonly known as Amsterdam 1928, was an international multi-sport event that was celebrated from ...

and captained the national team at the

1930 FIFA World Cup The 1930 FIFA World Cup was the inaugural FIFA World Cup, the world championship for men's national football teams. It took place in Uruguay from 13 to 30 July 1930. FIFA, football's international governing body, selected Uruguay as host nation ...

. Villaplane was also a

Nazi Nazism ( ; german: Nazismus), the common name in English for National Socialism (german: Nationalsozialismus, ), is the far-right totalitarian political ideology and practices associated with Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party (NSDAP) in ...

collaborator who was arrested and executed for his actions during

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...

Football career

In his career he played for

Sète Sète (; oc, Seta, ), also historically spelt ''Cette'' (official until 1928) and ''Sette'', is a commune in the Hérault department, in the region of Occitania, southern France. Its inhabitants are called ''Sétois'' (male) and ''Sétoises' ...

(1921–1924),

Nîmes Nîmes ( , ; oc, Nimes ; Latin: ''Nemausus'') is the prefecture of the Gard department in the Occitanie region of Southern France. Located between the Mediterranean Sea and Cévennes, the commune of Nîmes has an estimated population of 148,5 ...

(1927–1929),

Racing Club de France Racing Club de France, also known as RCF, is a French Sports club, omnisport club that was founded on 20 April 1882 under the name Racing Club. Racing Club changed its name to Racing Club de France (RCF) on 21 November 1885. The club is located a ...

(1929–1932),

Antibes Antibes (, also , ; oc, label=Provençal dialect, Provençal, Antíbol) is a coastal city in the Alpes-Maritimes Departments of France, department of southeastern France, on the French Riviera, Côte d'Azur between Cannes and Nice. The town of ...

(1932–1933) and

Nice Nice ( , ; Niçard: , classical norm, or , nonstandard, ; it, Nizza ; lij, Nissa; grc, Νίκαια; la, Nicaea) is the prefecture of the Alpes-Maritimes department in France. The Nice agglomeration extends far beyond the administrative c ...

(1933–1934). He was capped 25 times for the France national team and was the captain of the French side which went to the

. He played for Antibes in the first French professional championship in 1932–33. The League was divided into a Northern and a Southern section with each section made up of ten teams. Antibes finished top of the table in the Southern section and played Lille from the North for the Championship. Antibes won the match and the French league but were stripped of their title after being found guilty of match-fixing. The Lille manager was given a lifetime ban, but Villaplane, who was strongly suspected of fixing the matches, received only a small penalty. Villaplane then joined OGC Nice for the 1933–34 season. Having lost interest in his career and having become a regular horse race-goer, he made one last attempt to resurrect his career with the Bordeaux Second Division club Hispano-Bastidienne, but he ended the season in prison, having been sentenced for his part in a horse race-fixing scandal.

Criminal career

At the beginning of World War II, Villaplane became involved in the Parisian black market and in racketeering the local Jewish population. He was sentenced to two months imprisonment for

possession of stolen goods Possession of stolen goods is a crime in which an individual has bought, been given, or acquired stolen goods. In many jurisdictions, if an individual has accepted possession of goods (or property) and knew they were stolen, then the individua ...

in 1940. Through his criminal background, he came to the attention of the French ''

Carlingue The Carlingue (or French Gestapo) were French auxiliaries who worked for the Gestapo, Sicherheitsdienst and Geheime Feldpolizei during the German occupation of France in the Second World War. The group, which was based at 93 rue Lauriston in th ...

'', an organisation formed by the German

Reich Security Main Office The Reich Security Main Office (german: Reichssicherheitshauptamt or RSHA) was an organization under Heinrich Himmler in his dual capacity as ''Chef der Deutschen Polizei'' (Chief of German Police) and ''Reichsführer-SS'', the head of the Nazi ...

to conduct counter-insurgency operations against the French Resistance. The group, which was made up of collaborating criminals, was known colloquially as the French Gestapo. It was jointly run by two Parisian gangsters,

Henri Lafont Henri Lafont (born Henri Chamberlin, 22 April 1902 – 26 December 1944) was a French criminal based in Paris who headed the French Gestapo during the Nazi German occupation in World War II. He was executed by firing squad on 26 December 1944 ...

and

Pierre Bonny Pierre Bonny (25 January 1895 – 26 December 1944) was a corrupt French police officer. As an inspector, he was the investigating officer in the 1923 Seznec case, and was accused of falsifying the evidence. He was once praised as one of th ...

. Members utilised their criminal expertise and networks working for the Nazi security services in

occupied France The Military Administration in France (german: Militärverwaltung in Frankreich; french: Occupation de la France par l'Allemagne) was an interim occupation authority established by Nazi Germany during World War II to administer the occupied zo ...

and

Vichy Vichy (, ; ; oc, Vichèi, link=no, ) is a city in the Allier Departments of France, department in the Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes region of central France, in the historic province of Bourbonnais. It is a Spa town, spa and resort town and in World ...

. Villaplane specialised in the racketeering of gold merchants. In 1942, he left Paris for Toulouse to escape the Germans he had been trying to flee. His former teammate

Louis Cazal Louis-Pierre "Pierrot" Cazal (24 October 1906 – 27 September 1945) was a French international footballer. Cazal spent most of his career with Sète winning the Coupe de France The Coupe de France, formerly known as the Coupe Charles Sim ...

obtained new identity papers for him and he returned to Paris. He was arrested by the SS in 1943 for the theft of a quantity of precious stones and imprisoned at the Compiègne camp, although Lafont succeeded in obtaining his release. Villaplane then became Bonny's chauffeur and then, in 1944, head of one of the five sections of the North African Brigade, a criminal organisation made up of North African immigrants who collaborated with the Nazis through anti-Resistance activities.The forgotten story of ... the France football captain who murdered for Hitler
Paul Doyle, Monday 16 November 2009 14.11 GMT guardian.co.uk The fierce character of his recruits earned him the unflattering nickname of "SS Mohammed". He obtained both the rank and uniform of an SS-Untersturmführer. His section was put in charge of finding Resistance members and their supporters in the region of

Périgueux Périgueux (, ; oc, Peireguers or ) is a communes of France, commune in the Dordogne departments of France, department, in the administrative regions of France, administrative region of Nouvelle-Aquitaine, southwestern France. Périgueux i ...

in the month of March 1944, and then in the region of

Eymet Eymet (; oc, Aimet) is a commune in the Dordogne department in Nouvelle-Aquitaine in southwestern France. It is notable as a popular location amongst English speaking immigrants, who account for ten per cent of the local population. Geography ...

in the following month. It was in Eymet that he negotiated for the lives of hostages for money. On 11 June 1944, the day following the massacre at Oradour-sur-Glane, his squad had 52 people executed in

Mussidan Mussidan (; oc, Moissida) is a commune in the Dordogne department in Nouvelle-Aquitaine in southwestern France. Mussidan station has rail connections to Bordeaux, Périgueux, Brive-la-Gaillarde and Limoges. Population Roundup of 16 January 19 ...

Execution

He was sentenced to death on 1 December 1944 for his direct involvement in at least 10 killings. He was executed by firing squad on 27 December 1944 at the Fort de Montrouge,

Arcueil Arcueil () is a commune in the Val-de-Marne department in the southern suburbs of Paris, France. It is located from the center of Paris. Name The name Arcueil was recorded for the first time in 1119 as ''Arcoloï'', and later in the 12th c ...

References

External links

Le footballeur qui voulait être un SSTifo Football. 2018. Alexandre Villaplane: Football’s Psychopath?
* * {{DEFAULTSORT:Villaplane, Alexandre 1904 births 1944 deaths Footballers from Algiers Pieds-Noirs French footballers French gangsters French mass murderers France international footballers FC Sète 34 players Nîmes Olympique players Racing Club de France Football players OGC Nice players Ligue 1 players Ligue 2 players Association football midfielders Olympic footballers of France Footballers at the 1928 Summer Olympics 1930 FIFA World Cup players Nazi collaborators shot at the Fort de Montrouge FC Antibes players Algerian people executed abroad Sportspeople convicted of crimes SS-Untersturmführer Executed mass murderers

Football career

Criminal career

Execution

References

Further reading

External links