Panathinaikos has the best defense in the league, playing full attack | Blog – Nikos Athanasio

Nikos Athanasio writes about the main points of Panathinaikos’ excellent suspension job so far in the league.

One of the first things that Ivan Jovanovic He wanted to change to the hard drive of his players during his first season in Panathinaikos, were the individual and collective reactions when the ball was lost. Al-Khidr had understood his philosophy Laszlo Bologna Unconsciously, or on their own volition, they made moves back when they lost possession and it took a reasonable amount of time for the Clover to become a group producing a fairly good level of counterpressing, trying to recover the ball immediately, in the defensive transition.

Targeting the Serbian technician with this method of play was not and is not just about creating chances from offensive transmission, from “high” steals on the field. Obviously, it has to do with the way he wants his teams, specifically his Panathinaikos, to defend and not allow the opponent to get close to the defensive third of the “greens”.

If we add to this logic the high percentages of the ball(57%) Which contains “clover”, we came to the conclusion that this version, the version with the “seal” of Ivan, managed to have the best defense in the league to date, playing hard and absolutely.

As the recent history of the team (2020-2021) showed us, you can also play in defense with the first blocking line in the center of the field, without pressing, accepting several chances from the opponent and because of the goalkeeper’s failure, not accepting. Objectives. Almost everyone says and writes about the “terrible defense of Panathinaikos, which does not concede any goal.” Here we are in 2022 and reading about… 300 finalists, as a sample of sheer creativity and productivity, nothing should sound strange to you.

Therefore, the passive voice can lie. However, in the case of this year’s Panathinaikos, he is simply telling the whole truth, as we can see with the help of Wyscout. The Greens have only conceded two goals in eight matches but what really matters and worth mentioning is an indicator x goals Of his opponents in these matches, is the number of good chances that Jovanovic’s team allowed.

0.62 for each game, 5.01 In total. In eight games. Almost perfect. Moreover, it is no coincidence that Panathinaikos is at the top of a certain category in SL1.

At the same time, the “Tri-lobe”, in addition to not allowing many good opportunities for the opponents, does not allow them to approach the Brignoli area with claims, confirming all of the above about the way this team defends, presses and behaves defensively.

Therefore, in the first eight matches, Panathinaikos’ opponents fired in total 45 times. Here also the “Greens” are in first place and even by a small margin, where AEK comes second with a score of 54 and the third is Olympiacos with a score of 58.

In general, and if we had to evaluate the start of last year for Panathinaikos in relation to this year, then this 8/8 This is largely due to accommodating the coach’s “desires” in the barrier part, to changing the “chip” in the defensive transition and to the team’s control of the turf in all game situations, working together for a reasonable amount of time that creates the requisite harmony and cohesion, things that lead, among other things Other, to Panathinaikos’ transition from victory to victory.