The importance of the team of 22 players and the remaining 2 + 1 moves

One of the first decisions taken by Ivan Jovanović and the Panathinaikos management when they started planning for the new season was to continue to improve the (in-depth) quality of the team’s roster and above all to “increase” the number of “first-line” players “from the rotation” alfalfa”.

Not with additional options, but with the players who will be considered in the eleven, “deepening” the list of Panathinaikos as a whole.

Giannis Papadimitriou also fully accepted all of the above – which was laid out early on – when he took over as head coach on May 20.

Because this was the essence that Panathinaikos needed to take the next step and to be able to develop the project that started in May 2021: to increase the eleven options, which depend on quality, incidents with injuries and specific match features, were limited to 15 players last season.

This was the number of footballers who carried the biggest “burden” last year, and Panathinaikos finally found this ahead of them at the end of the championship (but also in the “brutal” month of January).

And of course with all the rest that he was constantly dealing with behind the scenes, culminating in the historical injustice and imbalance that the club suffered in the famous title match with Olympiacos, where everyone was forced to compete with 17 cases of injury. Corona virus disease.

Panathinaikos had to “grow” its list further in terms of the “first line” of its options and on this very axis it has moved so far in the transfer “window” and will continue to move in August.

With a view to, upon closing the reinforcement plan and the team’s overall potential, a roster of 22 ‘eleven’ players was formed.

Movements with a specific philosophy

Jovanovic and Papademitriou followed this logic in all of their choices, improving and developing what was already there as a very solid and stable base.

On the creative side, Filip Djuricic comes in to add the “unpredictability” and new ideas (which Fotis Ioannidis also mentioned in his interview with SPORT24 last week) that the team didn’t have last year and needs to add every sacrifice to its game.

The void left by Corbelis in the center of midfield was filled by Toni Filina – the strongest transfer to date in the Premier League – who came to add more quality, sprinting, vertical play, creativity and execution to the ‘8’. The most complete midfielder Panathinaikos has played in the last 11-12 years.

At the left end of the defence, Filip Mladenovic has not come to take … Juancar’s day off, but to equally claim the position in the side, being a highly creative full-back, with excellent crosses, set pieces and executions. One goal and one assist count so far in friendlies which is mid-July. Even if there is a “battle” for the eleven!

In the center of defense, Panathinaikos fell behind significantly because, among other things, they had many “packages”, but they had already found a stopper (Tin Gedvai) with an excellent playing profile and a complete running “package” that had “entered” the team’s philosophy, It will equally challenge the Schenkefeld-Magnusson duo. Also upgrade…

Even Zeka, who seemed to many to be a complementary move, who has returned to the “clover leaf” for the last football … from participation and is still able to give things to the team both competitively and in the locker room.

This is how you will go in the other movements as well

With this exact central tendency, the next transfers of Panathinaikos will take place in August. Because now, for a while, the whole club will hit the transfer … the brakes, putting the burden on the two pivotal matches with Dnipro.

From the back, however, Papademitriou and the rest of the squad will continue to work “quietly” to get (with Jovanovic’s latest proposal) the second stopper of equal quality, the right-back to be acquired with the potential to start and possibly even the ‘6’ depending always on the needs of the group and the options that the market will offer. .

Forming in the coming weeks a full roster of 22 (really) ‘first-line’ options, which will not only raise the level of quality and strength of the team, but also the internal competition in each training session at Kurobe and the overall quality of the work that will be done each day in Panathinaikos.

Because on July 25, in the first match against Dnipro in Kozice, a very difficult competitive season began, which (logically) will bring more than 50 matches in all competitions. And Panathinaikos must have all the solutions he needs to succeed…