WORLD SPORTS SCENE / RANDY HARVEY : Meet the George Steinbrenner of France

George Steinbrenner unarguably is controversial, but his notoriety is confined to one continent. When International Olympic Committee President Juan Antonio Samaranch of Spain visited Colorado Springs, Colo., last summer during a U.S. Olympic Committee meeting that focused on Steinbrenner’s status as an officer, Samaranch asked reporters, “Who is this man, George . . . ?”

When the subject is boorish, bullying sports moguls, the man most of the rest of the world thinks of first is Bernard Tapie.

Within the past year, the 47-year-old French entrepreneur, politician and former club singer has hired Franz Beckenbauer to coach his Olympique Marseille soccer team, fired Beckenbauer, accused referees of accepting bribes and been under investigation himself for attempting to bribe an opposing player.

Now, the French Football Assn. has suspended Tapie for eight months. League officials were not specific about the charges, but they said Tapie tried to intimidate referees last season with “malicious comments and precise threats.”

His team, which leads the league by five points and is trying to win its third consecutive championship, threatened to strike until Tapie is allowed to return, but he persuaded the players to fulfill their obligations. He said, however, that he might sell the team.

“Football is 10% of my activities and 90% of my problems,” said Tapie, who owns the giant athletic apparel and shoe company, Adidas.

Meantime, the league also fined Claude Bez $10,000 for making the unsubstantiated claim that Tapie tried to bribe an opposing player. Bez is the former owner of the Bordeaux team, Marseille’s archrival.

The $10,000 is the amount that Bez took from his former team’s coffers to have the Marseille general manager’s phone bugged.

Speaking of Steinbrenner: He may have been forced into the New York Yankees’ background, but he is back in the USOC’s forefront. A vice president since 1989, he resumed his duties at the board of directors meeting over the weekend in Dallas after becoming inactive last August due to the brouhaha engulfing him in baseball.

But when that controversy disappeared from the sports pages, USOC President Robert Helmick said he polled the executive committee members to see whether it was safe for Steinbrenner to return. Helmick said there was no opposition, which surprised Steinbrenner because he thought at least one influential critic, IOC member Anita DeFrantz of Los Angeles, would object.

Not so. Asked last week how she felt about Steinbrenner’s return, she said: “It doesn’t make that much difference to me. Am I angry? No. Am I hurt? No. Am I happy? (Pause) He’s OK. It’s the will of the body. On we go.”

And on Helmick goes. Now that the USOC’s board of directors has amended the constitution so that a president can serve two four-year terms, the Des Moines, Iowa, lawyer could be in that office until 1997 if he runs again in 1993. He has been the president since 1985, when he was appointed to complete Jack Kelly’s term. Kelly died of a heart attack three weeks after being elected.

Helmick said last week he would not decide until next year whether to seek re-election, but it would surprise his USOC colleagues if his answer is no.

Said one, who didn’t want to be identified: “He’ll return. His ambition is to become IOC president. Being the USOC president provides him with a platform to achieve that objective.” Helmick, 53, already is one of 11 IOC executive board members.

Vladimir Titorenko, basketball columnist for the Soviet Union’s sports newspaper, Sovietski Sport, has been in Los Angeles for a week to see Laker, Clipper and college games. He said he doesn’t expect the Soviets to repeat as Olympic champions in 1992, primarily because of the political discord in the republics.

Their best two best players in 1988, center Arvidas Sabonis and guard Sarunas Marciulionis, are Lithuanians, who already have said they won’t play for the Soviets. More recently, Titorenko said, the Soviets’ starting guards on a recent U.S. tour, both Latvians, quit the national team and returned to their capital city of Riga. He was told they were going to defend the television tower against a threatened invasion by the Soviet army.

Titorenko will be the guest of the NBA at the All-Star game next Sunday in Charlotte, N.C.

An update on the Mills family of Northbrook, Ill.:

--Nathaniel, 20, will compete this week in speedskating’s World Championships in Holland. He is the U.S. all-around champion.

--Hillary, 19, is a member of the U.S. junior team in speedskating and will compete in March at the World University Games in Japan.

--Phoebe, 18, has switched from gymnastics, in which she won a bronze medal at the Seoul Olympics, to diving. She is training in Boca Raton, Fla., under Olympic Coach Ron O’Brien and considering scholarship offers from Stanford and George Washington University.

--Jessica, 16, is a former world junior champion in figure skating who will compete next week in the U.S. nationals at Minneapolis.

--Lucas, 11, recently won all four races he entered in the national age-group speedskating championships at Butte, Mont. He competed over the weekend in the North American age-group championships at Calgary, Canada.

--Whitaker is a fourth-grader who likes to skate and sing.

Notes

Paul Edwards, who won the British indoor shotput championship Saturday, had to defend himself against charges of cowardice in the London tabloids. Called up two months ago by the Royal Air Force to serve in the Persian Gulf, the 31- year-old pilot was discharged last week so that he could continue to compete. The RAF said it responded to a request from Great Britain’s track and field federation. “It wasn’t me who asked not to go,” Edwards said.