A Full Week’s Recap

I’m back, and, apparently, so is AEK.  Maybe. They won last Sunday against OFI, which, given how poorly OFI has been playing, really doesn’t prove anything.  Also, since all four of AEK’s goals were scored AFTER OFI was reduced to 10 men in the 33rd minute, the result is even more inconclusive.  The win does put them back on top of the table after Panathinaikos managed only a draw against over-performing Larissa.  Against a ten man OFI, Manduca had a good game. He set up several plays and scored a goal. Blanco had a goal but missed at least one easy sitter. Rivaldo had a goal off an assist by Lyberopoulos, but it was nothing to get excited about. What was worth noting though was that Ferrer played Pappas and Pappas proved himself by scoring another long-range goal (for the first one see my post on Elfsborg from several weeks ago). I sincerely hope that Ferrer has woken up to the need to play the former Olympiacos winger more regularly. Here are some highlights from the game; Manduca’s goal is at the 4:40 mark and Pappas’s is at the 5:45 mark: 

For Thursday’s UEFA Cup fixture AEK played Fiorentiono, an Italian Club from Florence, Tuscany that currently sits fifth in Serie A (they finished sixth last season). By most accounts, AEK was quite lucky to walk away with a 1-1 draw. Lucky or not, I’ll take it. Some sour grapes here though. I watched the game last night (Friday) when I got back from my family vacation and my impression during the first half was that we looked more alive than we have in two or three weeks. My impression in the second half though turned less optimistic as we clearly did lack cohesion. Again, though, I was cheered by Ferrer giving play time to Pappas as well as Kone and Kafes. Although Pappas only went in in the 81st minute, he showed more life and creativity in ten minutes than some of our other guys have shown all season.

The bad news from this game though is that we appear to have a right back problem. Ramos Silva was directly at fault for Fiortenio’s goal against us. Indeed he seems to be directly responsible for a disproportionate number of goals lately. He is good at moving the ball up and distributing it from the wing, but he can’t defend well enough to fill his role in Ferrer’s typical 4-4-2 line-up. The good news on defense was that Papastathopoulos was ALL OVER THE PLACE, in a good way. He was our best player, tackling hard, clearing the line and distributing the ball up to midfielders.

Manu was crap, Manu was crap, Manu was crap. Do you think if we bloggers say it enough times Ferrer will stop playing him? Could he at least stop playing him for the full 90 minutes?

Group C now looks like this. Thankfully, we play Villareal at home but it will still prove a very tough match for us. Boleslav will be easier. We’ll need a win at Boleslav and at least a draw at Villareal.

Finally, in National Team news, Greece beat Hungary in an ugly 2-1 win with as many own goals as regular ones. One result though is that somebody is crying over seedings. And speaking of seedings, the qualifying groups for the 2010 World Cup were announced and Greece is sitting pretty with only a tricky Israel to worry about.