Olympic moments: The 1972 men's basketball final - in pictures

The 1972 men's Olympic basketball final in Munich was a sporting battle between the Cold War superpowers. The USA were unbeaten in the Olympics and were outright favourites going into the match. When Dwight Jones and Alexsander Belov tipped off (pictured), few could have imagined the drama that would ensue at the Rudii Sedlmayer Halle Photograph: Tony Duffy/Getty Images

The USA were trailing by a single point in the dying seconds, but Doug Collins sank two free throws to put them ahead 50-49 Photograph: AP

The American players began to celebrate what they thought was a victory. But their joy was cut short when the USSR coach claimed he had called for a time-out prior to the second free-throw. The officials bizarrely decided that both free-throws should be scored but that play should be restarted with three seconds on the clock
Photograph: AFP/Getty Images

After two farcical attempts to restart play, Ivan Edeshko made a long pass to Aleksandr Belov who collected the ball under the hoop and made a lay-up as the buzzer sounded ... Photograph: Rich Clarkson/Time & Life Pictures/Getty Image

The ball dropped through the hoop to give the USSR a controversial 51-50 victory Photograph: Rich Clarkson/Time & Life Pictures/Getty Image

The Americans were livid. They blamed the officials for a series of inexplicable decisions
Photograph: Rich Clarkson/Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images

The American coach Renato Righetto was so incensed he refused to sign the official score-sheet
Photograph: Bettmann/Corbis

The Americans made an official post-match protest, but the result was ratified by an Olympic jury Photograph: Bettmann/CORBIS

Consequently the Americans refused to attend the medal ceremony to accept their silver medals, creating one of the iconic podium moments in Olympic history
Photograph: Bettmann/Corbis