When I went to sleep yesterday Manolo Jimenez was still in charge of AEK. When I woke up it was Nikos Kostenoglou. ‘A decision both AEK and me agreed on’, as Jimenez put it, ‘AEK will always be in my heart, but it was time for a change.’
Jimenez has been our headcoach for about a year, and the first one since 2002 who was succesful when it comes to prizes: the Greek cup. The results so far in the 2011-2012 season seems to be the reason why he leaves. Losses in the Europa League against Anderlecht and Sturm Graz and ofcourse PAOK.
His successor Kostenoglou lives and breeds AEK. Played over 220 games for us in the Greek League between 1994 and 2005. Former AEK youth coach, assistant manager and headcoach part of the 2007-2008 season (we all remember that one!). After building up experience at Larissa and Asteras Tripolis he seems to be ready for the real thing. Sure hope so, because it will be a hell of a job to make this a succesful season for us.
Yep, 2 for 2 in the championship already. Who would have thought? Certainly not me (if I read correctly, we had 2 points by this time last season). And really, THESE are the games we must be winning. Take the 07-08 season for example, where easily avoidable home losses to teams like Iraklis and Panionios cost us the championship. Sure, derbies can go either way, but its beating the weaker opponents that counts most to ensuring success in the championship. And we’ve certainly done that so far, against two teams (Ergotelis and Xanthi) who have been known to give us a hard time when they wanted to.
Just by reading the score, two things are obvious. Our offense? Excellent! Our defense? Not so much.
We were brilliant going forward from midfield up. Vargas had a stand out game and is really making a tremendous impression on all of us. He’s technical, knows the game, and, as was evident from the game, can certainly finish.
Guerreiro, who we haven’t seen play in a while, also had a phenomenal game, with two assists. Sure, he is still a slow player, but his vision is excellent, and so were his set pieces (though the wind did help on some occasions). Lets face it, were stuck with him, and are still paying him, we might as well get some game time from him. Im not getting my hopes too high just yet though, this wouldn’t be the first time he impressed only to have a poor performance in the next game. But if he keeps this up, he can definitely be a useful player this season.
Belleck? Impressive once again. Fast, plays well with the team, had a great chance to score, and also got an assist (to add to his other from the Ergotelis game). Fantastic singing for us (Im gonna say he’s the best signing of the season along with Vargas).
Libe, Eidur, overall we were brilliantly going forward. 4 goals away to Xanthi is never easy but they managed it (its always great to see AEK score 4, especially in an away game). Afterall, this is the same Xanthi team that only barely lost to Olympiakos in Karaiskaki the week before. And that was only after they received a red card and had 5 minutes of extra time added to the game (of course Oly went on to score the winning goal in the 4th minute of extra time… convenient isn’t it?). So well done to our attackers.
Unfortunately, our defending was scary at times. It seems there is little communication going on these days, especially with the back four. Manolas had a poor game, and overall we were not effective at defending at all. Let too much slip by, sloppy and poor judgement from our defenders. I’m not sure what its gonna take, but they really must tighten up. The goals we conceeded could have been avoided, and when you’re up by two with so little time left, you really shouldn’t be letting goals in like that. Its worrisome that they managed to let Xanthi back in the game so many times.
Thankfully, Arabatzis played between the posts. Slightly at fault for the first goal, but he saved us a few times, notably on a one on one in the second half. Unfortunately, he had a tough game with the wind up north (Ive never seen wind like that at a football match). On more than one occasion after taking a goal kick, the ball would simply hover in the air and then slowly drift back toward the goal it came from.
SO. 2 for 2. Well done to Manolo for lining us up well finally and making the right subs at the right time. Defending needs work though, and urgently. Still, we’re in a great position so far, and confidence should be high. We’ll need it afterall, as we face PAOK in Toumba this weekend. A win here and things will be looking very good for us.
Oh, and of course, the goals from the match (Vargas’ goal was phenomenal):
And one final note. Once again, well done to our supporters. Amazing away support yet again (not long after the fantastic support they offered our team in Belgium). Nobody beats AEK supporters.
I’ll be honest, I wasn’t expecting much at all from this match. However, after seeing our players give it their all for much of the first half, I almost felt like we had a chance for the three points. But sadly fatigue, and terrible goaltending (if it can even be called that?) meant that any hard work we may have put in during the first half was soon forgotten.
Quite a few points can be taken from the match, the first of our Europa League Group Stage campaign:
1. Our supporters are simply the best. In a stadium of that size, during a financial crisis like the one they’re experiencing right now back in Greece, they still managed to get enough out to Brussells to easily outsing the home fans.
2. Konstantopoulos MUST NOT play for AEK. Ever. Again. I never had a problem with him, seems like a great guy, and might be a decent keeper for a second division side. But he’s terrible. And he easily could have kept us in this game today had he been bothered to try and make some saves.
I really hope this is the last we see of him for a while. There is no reason Arabatzis should be on the bench. I am confident the score would have been even going into half time had he been between the posts.
3. We can’t keep up with teams like these. The pressure we applied during the first half was great, but when you have players like Dellas, Libe, and Eidur all on the same starting XI, there is no way they can last the entire 90 minutes. Beleck should have started in Eidur’s place today with Jose Carlos starting in Libe’s place. As much as I respect both players (Libe more so than Eidur), they do not have what it takes any longer to keep up.
4. We desperately need Makos and Kafes back. Gentz was not good enough today, and failed to gain any control in the midfield. Thankfully Leo and Vargas were able to handle the ball distribution, but Lagos and Gentz could not compete with Anderlect’s midfield. And that was where we ended up losing most of the game.
5. WHAT A GOAL BY LEO! I’ll be forgetting about this game quickly, but our only goal today, scored by Leonardo, was a beauty. One of the best Ive seen all week (and that’s saying something considering the Benfica-Man U game yesterday itself had two beauties scored).
So. Poor start. Terrible start, rather. But what really hurts with this loss is that, with better goalkeeping, the match could have gone in a completely different direction. It was obvious, however, that we’re lacking in quality, simple as that. We’ll see what the other games bring us. Sure, its early. And things could get better… but I dont see it happening.
And to make things worse, Manolas (our best player today along with Leonardo) picked up a silly and unnecessary red card today. Yep, we’ll be without him and Makos for the next match. Lovely.
And a slightly off topic note, but I was very pleased to finally hear an English speaking commentator on my stream who A) actually knew AEK and B) could actually pronounce the names correctly. Definitely the first time Ive ever heard an English commentator pronounce “Georgeas” correctly.
So we play in Brussels against Anderlecht on thursday, our first game in the group stage of the Europa League. A very important game ofcourse, and a chance for retribution after last years Euro League games against the Belgians. But things don’t look very good for us. We didn’t get to play one game in the Superleague, so we lack playing rythm.
Maybe even more important, the AEK-players haven’t been paid for the last six months, due to financial problems. Chairman Adamidis promised tot take care of the payments within ten days. A brave promise, considering that everyone in Europe is waiting for an unavoidable Greek bankruptcy. Big question is what will happen next. To Greece and the Greek and on quite another level: what will happen to AEK and Greek football in general.
Bad news all around. Let’s hope there’ll be some good news too on thursday, a decent win would be nice. I’ll be at the Constant Vanden Stock Stadium to see for myself.
AEK has beaten the locals courtesy of goals from Manolas and two from Lagos.Unfortunately,I didn’t watch the game,but highlights can be found on this link….
I hope AEKMAN74 won’t mind me adding to his post, but I figured I’d just add to his rather than post a new entry. I only managed to find a decent stream in time for the second half so that’s all I can comment on, but I still won’t say much. To be honest, we really should have scored at least another two goals in the final 45 minutes, with the chances we had. However, credit to Larissa, they managed to claw their way back. Also, credit for the their second goal, it was some very nice football indeed on their part.
The fact that we managed to let Larissa get within one goal of drawing the match however, after having a 3-0 lead from so early on, is a fairly scary thought considering we have the playoffs and a Cup Final coming up.
I won’t say much more about the game, I missed quite a bit of it. It is a shame, however, to see Larissa drop to the second division. I know alot of people may be happy about it, but I personally would much rather see teams like Panionios, Xanthi, and Volou out of our league as soon as possible. Larissa are a club with a brand new and very attractive stadium, supporters who managed to create an impressive atmosphere on Sunday, a side who recently won the cup and also had an impressive run in the UEFA Cup a few years back. These are the teams who should be staying up in order to benefit our league in general, rather than clubs run and operated by scum like Panionios, Volou, and Kavala (as well as many others… ).
Oh well, the league is pretty much done for the season aside from one more game. Now we have the playoffs and Cup final to look forward to. What will happen after that, come the start of next season, none of us will know. However, the team has a great chance now to win a cup and book a place in the qualifying rounds for Champions League. Its all I can hope for right now…
Europe is over for us once again yet things could have so easily gone the other way!
We played a well fought match and the passion was very obviously there from our players. Throughout the entire first half they pressured and never gave up chasing the ball. Our passing was smooth, players looked calm and collected when under pressure in the attack, and things really were going well for us for the first 40 minutes or so. We managed to force a number of corners, we were coming close, yet our finishing in front of goal was poor and we were generally not as tight as we needed to be during our scoring chances.
Things started looking even better however as AEK were rewarded a penalty after Scocco was taken down in the box. Not too long before half time, it was a great opportunity to make our mark on the game. Blanco, unfortunately, failed to convert though and instead sent the ball over the net.
To make things worse Zenit score the game’s first goal after a weak counter attack, one which was a result of a poor pass from Liberopoulos. And this, only minutes before half time.
The second half was much the same though it was clear the goal took some spirit out of our guys. Jimenez tried some changes such as bringing on Burn’s and putting Diop on for Dellas though the subs had little impact. We couldn’t finish, we couldn’t produce in front of the net, and we paid for this as Zenit were soon up 2-0 and ended the game with a third to make it 3-0. The result meant only a loss for Anderlecht would have got us through, however they were more successful than us and ended up with a 2-0 win.
Another season and Europe is over for us. I know we haven’t had as much success as we would have liked these past few years, but this particular loss hurts almost as much as that unfortunate draw with Anderlecht four seasons ago. If only Blanco had scored the penalty things would have very likely ended differently. We were in control until then and had our own fate in our hands, even a draw would have seen us through.
Attendance was a little less than 30,000 from what I hear and despite the cold and general strike, a match as important as this should have drawn a better crowd. An extra boost from our fans may have given the players the last bit of inspiration they lacked on the pitch, but the atmosphere I heard sounded like a pretty good one. However, games like these emphasize so strongly the fact that we urgently need our own stadium, one where opponents would never feel safe or comfortable on nights like these.
Heartbreaking, to say the least! After a 45 minutes dominated by AEK, great support from our fans, lovely football, what do we get?? A missed penalty by Blanco and a counter attack goal for Zenit. To be honest I can’t really describe what I feel right now… maybe a little anger, disappointment. And to make matters worse Anderlecht are winning 2-0 (no surprise there) which means we must score a goal, otherwise the round of the 32 will be nothing but a dream for us. PAOK and Aris have already advanced, but it looks like it will be a difficult task for us to do the same.
We can’t give up hope yet though, we played some very nice football in the first and could have easily been up by a goal or two had we been a bit tighter in the box… we can do this!! FORZA AEKARA!!!
Haven’t seen the match yet, haven’t even managed to find videos of all three goals yet. But wow, what a sweet vitory, only days after we beat Oly in the 90th! Hajduk fans come to our country, trying to cause trouble, talk dirty online, and then we put another three past them, making six in two games! Hajduk are out now, and 2nd place is now very much a possibility for us as all we need is a point from the match with Zenit at oaka. We can do this!
Goals today came from Scocco (penalty), Manolas (Beauty of a header from what I’ve heard), and Blanco (calm finishing after a beautiful pass from Leonardo launched him into a 1 on 1 with the keeper). Gentzoglou missed a few sitters yet again apparently.
So, I watched most of the first half and parts of the second, but one thing was obvious today. We didn’t deserve even a point today looking at how we played. PAO tied 1-1 at home against Larissa, yet for the second week in a row we fail to capitalize on a great opportunity and instead of being that much closer to first we now sit in fourth place (with three teams playing tomorrow who could catch up to us).
We had very little organization and could not gain any control of the game. We started with Djebbour and Blanco but many feel that Libe should have gotten the start. I know he only recently returned from injury but I think he could have made a difference. However, to add to our injury problems, Djebbour seems to have injured his shoulder, an injury which has bothered him in the past as well. I’m not sure the details yet, but things are starting to look tough again. Both Manolas (completely undeserved) and Dellas (who was on the bench!) received red cards meaning our options on the pitch are starting to look thin once again.
PAOK today were average at best, and had we showed up and played some football I am confident we could have seen even all three points. It’s a shame really since PAOK has seemed to become that team lately that we can always count on for points. Afterall, the last time they beat us in the league was 2007.
Our shots on net statistic for the match is pretty frightening… only 3 in the entire 90 minutes! And our one goal came from a penalty. Things really aren’t looking good, and we have some critical matches coming up in both the league and Europe… hopefully we can turn things around but it does seem like we’ve been saying that for a while.
Alot happened during and after the game, and I’m still confused around many of the details. Firstly, there were a couple incidents on the bench. One main one involved Dellas and a PAOK fan who threw a 1.5 liter bottle at the players (I am not sure if the bottle was thrown at the bench or Dellas specifically). Dellas threw the bottle back resulting in a red card. I’ve heard that Dellas is looking into taking legal action against the fan, so we’ll see. However, this is not nearly the first time incidents like this have happened at Toumba. You would figure they would look into resolving the the problems, maybe by making moderations to the stadium? I hate to see that happen, but its clear that fans like these cannot be given all the privileges of other fans. I know all teams in Greece has fans who cause trouble, and AEK certainly has many. However, this sort of thing is pretty much your average occurrence for a PAOK game.
It doesn’t end there though! Remember the incidents involving fans AEK players after the Panionios match? Well, 50 PAOK fans were outside the AEK change rooms yelling at Dellas, Dimitriadis, and co… only in Greece does stuff like this happen! How 50 fans can get there in the first place, let alone stay without being forced away immediately, I will never understand.
If anyone watched the match, please leave a comment. I would like to comment more on our actual performance but I was distracted at the time of the game. Thanks!
Frustrating, disappointing, nerve wrecking… all suitable adjectives for describing today’s the game.
Firstly, we still have hope. Zenit beat Hajduk in Croatia today meaning the race for second place is very, very tight. If we can manage to turn things around, second place is very possible.
We started todays game strong, creating a few excellent chances (sitters, really) but failed each and every time to get the ball in the back of the net. We had fairly good control on the match throughout the first 45 and looked good considering we were missing key players like Roger, Scocco, and Liberopoulos. We were certainly showing much more determination than the match with Panionios, but we were still severely lacking discipline from the midfield up.
Our goal finally came through a penalty in the second half. But the good news ends there. Anderlecht turned the pressure up a notch after conceding while it seemed our guys seemed to drop down considerably and eventually it was the Belgian team’s turn to score after some poor (and I mean POOR!) defending from our guys. Having said that, Manolas had a great game today, though I did get worried when I saw him complaining about injuries.
All things considered, there is still hope in my opinion. Manolo’s second European match only and the players have had to deal with quite a few games in a short period of time (and the number of injuries meant little flexibility with resting certain players). Circumstances clearly aren’t ideal, and we were saved towards the end by some key Saja saves, but all is not lost yet. After all, this is Anderlecht we’re talking about… when was the last time we were lucky while playing them?
Some better news as well… our team has finally begun training in Spata! The pitch looks great, such a massive improvement over the sand pit there were training on at Thrakomakedones. This will only help our team in the future and its a great moment in our history. There is still work that needs to be done but the facilities look very nice indeed.
When I went to sleep yesterday Manolo Jimenez was still in charge of AEK. When I woke up it was Nikos Kostenoglou. ‘A decision both AEK and me agreed on’, as Jimenez put it, ‘AEK will always be in my heart, but it was time for a change.’ 
