Bananas

Surprising Biseswar is not in the squad. Maybe the fapes Lucescu copped in training affected his critical thinking ? ? It’s quite conceivable this game could go to extra time and Biseswar would be perfect. Not sure why Jaba is in the squad when we have Warda. Anyway, it is what it is. Biseswar is terrible with his fitness this time of the season.

Shame on you. Good luck to my fellow fruitaki.

Yeah, no penalty. Having said that the GK should’ve read it better and not let Prijo sell him like that. Maybe Savvidis investments in Greece are finally beginning to pay off ? Olympiacos fans would think that is 100% penalty if you show them that play but cgi it so that Prijo is wearing a red and white jumper. ?

Poppycock. Vlachodimos would pick Greece all the way.

Hopefully we can kill the game off as early as possible so Matos and Vieirinha can get some rest. We can’t have them playing 50+ games. Ideally if Tosca works out, we can even have games where Vieirinha plays as a RB as it’s our weakest position. Last chance for Kitsiou this year. Needs to step up.

Don’t forget Vlaxodimos too. The kid is a gun keeper and it’s already looking good for him at Benfica. It’s actually unusual that Greece has so many decent keepers to pick from right now. Having said that, if Greece were playing a game right now, as in today, yeah man, you’d be crazy not to pick Paschlakis.

Will be interesting to see where he ends up. I can’t see many teams in the GSL being interested in him. At least not on the sort of wages he’d like. Right now Klaus isn’t worth 50K per year.

Where did you see that Stafylidis is interested ? It would certainly make things interesting. I’d go so far as to say if (and it’s a big if) we sign Stafylidis, we’ll win the league. The depth in the squad would be so strong.

Checking out his performance on transfermarkt he’s played the majority of his games as a CB in the past 2 seasons. Having said that he’s played in stronger leagues so he could be quite capable as a LB in the GSL.

Stuff like this makes me so happy. https://paokvoice.com/191144/etsi-panigyrise-n-yorkivid

Ha ha ha. You''re a legend.

Great result. Couldn't ask for anything more really. I wanted a score draw. Benfica outplayed us but should we be surprised at that ? They are a quality team and no matter what your tactics, it's impossible to restrict teams of that quality to no scoring opportunities. The best you can do is limit their chances and those they do have to apply as much pressure as possible. It would've been interesting to see how Pontus would've helped had he been fit enough to play. Even 3 in the middle against a team of Benfica's quality is an option. I fully expect Benfica to still control the flow of the game in Toumba. It's not like their quality will suddenly drop because they'll be playing away. It will come down to moments, but at least we have given ourselves a good start and that's all I wanted. The important thing is we are developing a winning mentality, well at least a better one than we used to have. It doesn't guarantee anything and even if we don't qualify next week, the team is moving in the right direction. @Yiankos your favourite player, Crespo, apparently had a great game. ?

Looks like Tosca will be our next signing. I’m feeling a bit meh about this one. I was really really really hoping and wishing we’d get Stafylidis. Tosca’s second position is as a CB so I’m guessing he’s nothing like Matos or Vieirinha in terms of attacking ability.

Carlos Zambrano loaned to Basel for one season! Maybe they should have got him a few weeks ago before we gave them 5 big ones.

Reading that Castillo, Benfica’s striker is injured and will miss both games. Not sure if he is meant to be their starting striker or not as he only joined the club this season, but he was their highest purchase so far this transfer window. So it looks like Facundo Ferreyra will be their starting striker. Name ring a bell ?

11th spot is attainable. Not that we’ll get it, but at least it’s a possibility. One day if PAO get their crap together we can start looking at Greece doing better in the rankings.

Our fans were zoa. Instead of kissing his feet they spat on him. All this while he didn’t even want to be transferred to PAO but was forced out because the club needed the money. And to top it off he came back to the club free.

According to the Bananas school of though, if you’re going to have older players, you want them in the back, where you don’t want mistakes, you want players that can read the game and close down gaps and generally have to do less running. Goalkeepers it doesn’t matter what age they are. Just look at Buffon the manga. Our defence is all oldies. But I’m ok wit him that. They are at “peak” age for those positions. The only issue will be that they have at most a couple of years before we’ll need to look at replacing them. In the middle we have Mauricio who again is at peak age. Pontus is old but he’s not normal. Up front is where Lucescu seems to be going for younger players. Pelkas, Warda, Limnios, Jaba. It’s going to bed really interesting to see what Akpom is like as a player. This signing feels a bit off to me but we’ll see. Too early to tell.

Good article on Pontus. http://www.espn.com/soccer/club/cska-moscow/1963/blog/post/3442143/arsenal-have-been-missing-a-player-like-cskas-pontus-wernbloom

Hopefully we don’t sell either Warda or El Khaddouri. EK had a very average season last season, but you can see he has quality about him. Also he was injured and just didn’t get into a proper rhythm. I’m not convinced yet that he hasn’t got more to give. I’d like to see him with us for one more season. As for Warda, he ain’t proved jack yet. I think people are getting dazzled over his dribbling. Let’s see how the rest of his game develops before we put him on a pedestal.

You people are crazy. Or should I say CRAY CRAY amerikanakia. Sell Prijo for 10. I wouldn’t even entertain the thought for anything under 15+. And as far as selling him goes do you do it now when you’ve never been closer to CL ? All it’s going to take is us getting into CL and these stupid clubs around the world will start throwing money at our players ... because they can. If I believed strikers like Prijo are that easy to find I wouldn’t mind selling him so much. I just don’t think they are that easy to find. The guy is gold paidia. Ksipniste.

Gossip on inpaok about Sporting interested in Prijovic. Sounds like Benfica playing tricks to me. On a side note, I think, and hope, the days of us selling key players cheaply are over. — edit — ipad auto correct is brain dead.

It is kind of lame but I guess if he ends up being the player we hope (i.e. he maintains his form) then it could become a “thing”. It’ll be funny to have a packed Toumba chanting “Pontus Pontus”. My hope is that he becomes a talismanic player in the mold of Garcia. Our team is very very robust these days and the only thing left to make it click into place has been a midfield general to just god damn f##king impose himself on the game and drive the team. To be fair, Vieirinha has been good in this role and truly surprised me with his drive and professionalism. Pontus Pontus Pontus Pontus Pontus ...

For a salary of 1 million plus a year you could put any name you want on my back. Just saying.

Fair point about possibly extending Shakhov’s contract. Age is on his side and I noticed Lucescu praised him quite highly in the post match interview against Spartak. Maybe Moulin might get more game time if Canas goes. Having said that I believe Moulin is an 8 so he’s not really a like for like replacement for Canas.