When your first summer goal is Europe, you have to back it up with written action – Yannis Seretis

Yiannis Seretis writes about the Greek national teams’ journey in this year’s European qualifying campaign, which ends with the return match between Panathinaikos and Lens.

So, we are two days away from the last qualifying match for the Greek national team this summer. And one step away from the minimum, we can win as Greek football among the three teams that entered the test. The minimum for him Bauk Participation in the Europa League round of 16. And that’s where he ended up after the “suicide” against Malmö. It’s hard to get such a big chance in the next few years: Malmö in the third qualifying round, Sparta Prague in the playoffs. What more could he want from the lottery?

Its minimum Eek Staying out of Europe. That is, getting stuck in one of the three low obstacles on their way: Inter Escaldes, Noa, Ruzoberok. If you put Almeida and Eliopoulos together to write an “order” to UEFA, they wouldn’t have written a more perfect trio! And yet the “accident” happened. It happened again. It will happen again, it’s not unlikely. Football is…

minimum for him Panathinaikos It was also destined to stay out of Europe. He passed Botev with ease, and then the “choice” happened to him. He would have played for Jagiellonia if he got past Ajax and his European presence would have already been guaranteed. This time it didn’t “sit down” for him. Was he better than Marseille and PAOK last year in his two historic qualifying matches? No! Only Carvalhal’s Olympiacos was (slightly) better last year with a 3/3 score over Trivelli on penalties. And he wasn’t even better than Ajax in both matches. For this, the players and the coach are not primarily responsible, but the club.

When your first summer goal is Europe, you have to back it up with action! And that goes for all three! AEK did their preparatory work better than all three. They missed the forehand substitute. He’s just at that level. Banned because Levi didn’t play in the return match with Noah? No. He was banned mainly because he made history in Armenia with the goals he conceded. That’s why, in this particular case, the blame for the failure lies primarily with the players and Almeida. Not Eliopoulos. The players and Almeida did not support “the first goal is Europe in the summer”.

In PAOK and Panathinaikos, the club is responsible. The management. Especially for PAOK who saw from the draws that the great dream, eternally repressed, was not as far away as in previous years. Did he do what he could convey? Was he ready? No. His new players were not ready to help him as much as they should have – not to mention that he still has a real “six”, Thiemiani! Lucescu is right to complain – strange, incessant! Maybe it’s his “curse”, his strangeness. It’s difficult, maybe impossible, to find the spark you had last year when you think that if you had the right “tools” in your hands, the “master” would have succeeded. It continues in the Europa League and I hope for the club that its coach finds the “spark” of last year, because if he doesn’t, it will face great difficulties as a club this year.

For Panathinaikos, there was only one “lap” left, the match against Lens, a clearly superior team, better than Ajax as a team. He went and played against the Dutch with striker Geremiev (!!!) and winger Djuricic – Mancini who were substitutes last year! First game for Ioannidis in Amsterdam, and first game for Tite too. With Mladenovic as the starting left-back (excellent offensively, problematic defensively), with substitute goalkeepers Sinkefeld – Katri and the substitute “eight” Vilina who is now looking to sell, because… he understood that he needs the “eight”! He was unlucky, but he was not prepared either. Especially when you want to go further and eliminate superior teams, you have to be more prepared, almost perfect! And he paid for that with Ajax, despite the good effort he made. Let’s see what he will do tomorrow with Lens! Perhaps the god of football is smiling on him, just as in France, where if Medina had not been sent off in the 22nd minute, we do not know how much would have been written on the scoreboard. Two of the four main defenders have already been out (Medina and Danso, who was sold to Roma)…

Bottom line as they say in our villages: when you really consider that participating in the Europa League is your main summer goal, you have to “pass it on” to the entire organization (players, coaching staff, fans) and everyone together supports it in their own efforts. Greek teams have a long way to go to achieve success in this area, and accept any “cost” that this focus on the first 3-4 matches of the tournament may entail.