Bananas

Considering we had fair warning regarding Leovac not playing anymore, I'm a bit disappointed Azevado is the best we could find. Oh well, he might get match fit by the end of the season. Or he might get injured. Or he might surprise us all. I still think Hult would have been the far safer option and he's more than adequate for the SL.

^ What he said.

Pfft I’m a PAOK fan. I’ll take it with a shovel of salt. Still, I think it’d be a solid signing. The only thing I can see being a problem is Hult possibly not wanting to play for another team in Greece. He may be biding his time to see what other offers come in. Ah the suspense of the “metagrafiko” period ...

Where are you hearing about Hult ? I can’t find anything on it.

Hopefully the plan is to go for Hult and use these other players as media distractions. Ultimately we just need a player that is at least as good as Leovac and I think Hult is at least that. Anything better is a bonus. If we want a top class LB that is fit and in form I doubt such a player is available mid year.

I assume the Hult transfer is a done deal. His wiki page states he plays for PAOK ha ha. Seriously though, I’d prefer Hult over the one from Shakhtar who has been injured badly. We don’t need another Leveque.

So we are at the half way point of the season. It is time to grade the team, manager and players. Team Overall I would say the season has been disappointing but I remain optimistic. The reason for the disappointment is the terrible and shocking elimination in the EL and the loss of many points away from home. The encouraging aspects so far are our home form and the "feel" of the team which is that it has generally been improving and it feels like the team is beginning to click. With a SL record of 9 wins, 4 draws and 2 losses we are in a position to challenge for the title. Even though it is not normally enough points to challenge, this is a strange year where teams are dropping points they normally would not have. In the second half of the season we have 8 home games (vs 7 for both Olympiakos and AEK) so we are definitely a chance. Manager : Lucescu Started off disastrously with the EL elimination. Some of his team selections have appeared odd but it looks like he is beginning to gel with the squad. All things considered I'm more than happy to stick with Lucescu as the team seem like it is "on the up". The only serious criticism I have is his stubborn selection of El Khaddouri game after game. I can only assume Lucescu hoped for El Khaddouri to come good through match time. I dare say he could be the first manager we keep for more than 12 months in the Savvidis era. GK Rey : Solid. Overall I'm pleased with this signing, at least compared to GK's we have signed in the past (Brkic, Olsen). I wouldn't say he's better than Glykos but certainly doesn't seem worse. On the plus side he's a good age. I'm a little unsure why he's been dropped in favor of Paschalakis in recent games as I don't think he's played badly. Paschalakis : Solid. Surprise packet #1. It's still early too judge him but he seems to be quite decent. l think we are all right for GK's. Once Glykos comes back it will be interesting to see how it all plays out as I consider all 3 GK's to be of a similar standard. Defense Matos : Solid. Doing what he does. Could be the best signing of the Savvidis era. He is something else. Zambrano : Solid. I think he's part of the reason why we have such a good defensive record. It's disappointing he's leaving. His wages are very high and it appears this is the reason the club is letting him go. Varela : Solid. Can't really complain. Crespo : Solid. But seemed to have regressed a little (I thought he was our best CB last season). Seems to have picked up his form a little with more game time now that Zambrano and Leovac are not playing. Leovac : Average. Some good games and some mediocre ones. I won't be disappointed if he leaves. Leveque : Fail. Not his fault but we should not have signed an injury prone player. Malezas : Solid. Has played well recently when he has been selected. Can't ask for more than that. We obviously need to sign a CB and a LB to replace Zambrano and Leovac. At a minimum I would hope the CB is at a similar level to Crespo/Varela. For the LB obviously I would like a clone of Matos but we will see what the winter transfer period brings. Midfield Mauricio : Average. I know he has had some good matches and when he is playing well he is a level above the other midfielders (Canas, Cimirot) but given his wages I was expecting even more. To be fair he started off slow so I'm looking for more in the second half of the season. Canas : Average. At one stage I thought he would not play for us again. He is a limited player but if you play him as a straight 6 that is where he does best. With some matches recently seems to be finding some form finally. Cimirot : Solid. What can I say he is a very consistent player. Kace : Disappointing. Has not managed to get any meaningful game time and I don't think he will get any more in the second half of the season. It really is time the team let this kid go. Pelkas : Solid. Surprise packet #2. His recent form has been very good since El Khaddouri got injured and he got his opportunity. I hope he goes from strength to strength. Biseswar : Disappointing. After his form towards the end of last season I really thought he would take that number 10 role and make it his. Not to be. I hope he can get some more game time as I think he has the biggest "x" factor of all our midfielders and on his day can destroy the opposition. Shakhov : Disappointing. I don't see him being anything more than a rotation player unfortunately. El Khaddouri : Disappointing. Is still struggling to impose himself on the game. Vierinha : Average. Given his wages he should be the best player on the team. Don't get me wrong. He is solid but I'm not seeing him dictate the game the way I was hoping. Signed for obvious talismanic reason. On the plus side, he can play multiple roles. I don't think we need to sign any midfielders. There is plenty of depth and they are all solid players ... in theory. The only problem is the fluctuating form of the players. Lucescu needs to find a way to get the best out of them. Forwards Mak : Disappointing. Very disappointing. I thought he was going to tear up the SL. Limnios : Solid. Surprise packet #3. Given this kid is only 19 I have high hopes for him. Hopefully he continues to get game time. Djalma : Solid. Similar to Cimirot you know what you are (and are not) going to get. Koulouris : Average. Really confused as to what he is doing in our squad to be honest. Prijovic : Solid. Is key to our season even if he has been disappointing away from home. I was hoping for even more goals but maybe I am being greedy or unrealistic. I think we need to sign a striker to rotate with and complement Prijovic.

It's a dangerous tackle but there was no malice. The Olympiakos player had his eyes on the ball not the man. I don't think he even knew the man was there until the moment the ball got close to him. I see these sorts of tackles often. Is it a yellow ? Is it a red ? Not sure. The important thing is consistency from the referees so the players know where they stand (or not depending on if they were the one being kicked in the head or doing the kicking).

Prijovic also has an aerial presence and forces the opposition to man mark in the box freeing up space for other players to find holes. Klaus is good these days just for showing off his tattoos. Don't know what happened to Klaus since last year. Before then at least he was semi reliable and consistent. His dip in form has been drastic for no apparent reason. If anything, he should've been getting better.

Ugh, yet again. It's getting tiresome.

What did the fans do this time ?

So I'm reading Koutroubis will be leaving PAO. Does anyone think he'll be decent as a rotation player for us ? Not sure as to his ability to be honest.

Stafylidis would be a great signing but yeah it's not going to happen. Either way we need a left back. We've gone from Leovac > Leveque > Vieirinha > Crespo. Should be our first priority. Next priority should be a CB if Zambrano is leaving and some cover for Prijovic. Koulouris alone ain't going to keep us in contention for the title.

Wrong! Every one I talk to that travels from Australia to Greece and returns says the same thing ... "Crisis ? What crisis ? The bouzoukia are full my friend!". The sad thing is they are not joking.

In an ideal world we would keep Zambrano. Overall he's been very good aside from a couple of errors but that's to be expected. He does need lessons in driving though. The idea of having Zambrano plus one of Varela and Crespo rotating gives us a solid set of CB's and it shows in our defensive record this season. I can only assume you are correct and we are trying to save money given the fiasco in not qualifying for EL group stage. Even so, it was unlikely we would acquire him next season given his wages are so high. I just hope that the good form Varela has had this season doesn't drop off once there is less competition for the CB position.

Patsa ?

Sounds like UEFA is giving PAO the chance to sell some players in the coming transfer window and then revisit the issue after that. As for the idea of asking the fans to donate, it's great ... in theory. But given the current situation why should the fans donate. There is still no transparency on what the exact financial situation at the club is. At the very least a sincere administration would offers shares to the fans. But apparently that is the bastion of rich owners only. Fans should just donate and not ask questions apparently. I'm not even a PAO fan and this situation is frustrating. As an aside, if the fans actually could get organised and get 300,000 people to donate 50 euros each, you don't even need a "rich" president at that point. You have the ability to run it for yourselves. A true fan club.

They are not the Dinamo Kiev of a few years ago. AEK has definitely got a chance of qualifying.

Let's see if we can drop some points against the bottom team!

If we get rid of Rey based on Paschalakis playing one decent game that would be lunacy. But then again, we are PAOK ha ha.

Am I missing something ? Why isn't Rey going to be GK ?

Agree it will be interesting to see what happens with Glykos. He's a little unlucky with the injury as he'd finally after all these years of being the 2nd keeper at PAOK started to really become a pretty steady keeper. I really felt for him when he accepted that award (forget what it was) and he got all emotional.

The kid can play. Too bad he doesn't have a brain.

@Blackhawk and @Athens4 bravo palikaria. Great photo.

They're falling over like flies. Imagine if we had a European campaign as well.