Opponents joined forces in condemnation of their European championship victory over Lithuania on Sunday.

Angry Lithuanian players accused U.S. referee George Toliver of calling deliberate fouls and penalties against them to give Yugoslavia the edge, while 20,000 fans chanted "It's fixed" when the Yugoslavs raised the trophy at the award ceremony.

"The victory was stolen from the Lithuanians who deserved it," former Greek national coach Costas Politis said. "It was the best team in the tournament. It seems that the Serbian lobby had predetermined the winner of the European championship."

"The throne was set up," cried Sportime, Greece's biggest sports newspaper, in a banner front-page headline on Monday. "Yugoslavia beat Lithuania 96-90 in the darkest final ever in basketball history." The Lithuanians were particularly upset when Toliver penalised Seattle SuperSonics guard Sarunas Marciulionis and giant pivot Arvydas Sabonis for protesting a disputed foul 13 minutes before time to give the Yugoslavs a 72-64 lead. Toliver went on to penalise the Lithuanian bench two minutes before the end. The Yugoslavs swept 89-83 ahead, converting the bonus free throws. For a moment it looked like the match would end there and then with the Lithuanians walking off and refusing to return to the court. But they changed their minds when threatened with a $50,000 penalty.

"Our decision to leave the court was the right one, but they told us we had to pay a $50,000 penalty if we did (not return) and we were not brave enough to do it, although Sabonis offered to pay," Lithuanian coach Vladas Garastas said. "Toliver's calls were terrible." He joined the Greeks, who lost to Yugoslavia in the semifinal, and other teams in accusing the game's world body FIBA of allegedly cooking up the schedule in the preliminaries to protect Yugoslavia from playing two hard matches in a row. "They (Yugoslavia) had the green light from the start to win this tournament. It is a question of politics and those involved should be ashamed," Garastas said. Marciulionis, voted the tournament's Most Valuable Player, said: "European basketball reached bottom. We are not puppets, we are basketball players and it's sad not being able to control our destiny. This is not sport, this is politics." FIBA's Yugoslav general secretary Borislav Stankovic did not escape criticism.

"If FIBA and the strongman (Stankovic) of world basketball wanted so badly to give the trophy to Yugoslavia they could have done so without putting us through all this trouble for 14 days," Sportime said ironically. Stankovic, who fought hard to lift U.N. sanctions against Belgrade in sports, was not present at the awards ceremony.