ECL-PO-L2: PAOK - Heart of Midlothian (31.08.23, 20:30 EEST)

[Soprano76]

Mr Underwear is in. Hell yea!

[Dutch Eagle]

8 minutes ago, Dutch Eagle said:

Ehhhmmmm. Dinamo Zagreb lost 5-4 on aggregate to Sparta Praha and join our ECL. So it is no pot 1 probably.

But things are going well. AEX and Pana no CL and more important no big money for just entering GS. They go to EL and join the Gavroi (leading 1-5 on agg. at 53’) and they share the market pool for EL with the three of them. We are in ECL and won’t have to share the marketpool.

[pash]

Vrakas came in for Zivkovic. Pleasantly surprised

[Dutch Eagle]

Vrakas with his first minutes. He replaces Andrija.

[Dutch Eagle]

FT. GS again!

[pash]

I guarantee you Ozdoyev will have more yellows per season than Augusto did haha

[pash]

This team is finally starting to believe.

[Bananas]

Great outcome.  These european qualifications are always so damn stressful with so much at stake.

[Athens4]

We must hand it to Lucescu. He has worked wonders with the limited resources.

Also, I feel like I will have love-hate relationship with Brandon this season. Exceptional performance tonight, though I believe he should be playing behind the striker. Indeed he scored, but his approach play and setups were excellent. He can't take on players to save his life but he can play a damn good ball behind the defence.

[pash]

Guess it's up to Lucescu (and his teammates!) to put him in the best position to succeed. Teams in second- and third-tier leagues - like ours - need to find these kinds of advantages with otherwise compromised players.

 

Here are the highlights - what a fantastic save by Vieirinha about 2:15 in. I missed that toe flick in real time. He was rightfully pumped.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DLxKN978Fqc

[Athens4]

Solid game from Vieirinha. Not sure he will be able to play like that against better sides though.

[PaokCT]

I was skeptical about Taison but let me tell you he is becoming one of our best players. And he seems to be loved by his teammates. He is making the same impact Biseswar made upon coming here. With the new signings we got, and hopefully one more winger, we have a great chance to challenge for the title.

[pash]

I was just thinking last night how wildly different he looks this season. Perhaps it's the weirdly long time it takes players to acclimate to Lucescu's style?

[Athens4]

The guy is 35 and sprinting like a 25 year old.

[pash]

I had to do a triple-take here. Wow, good on him, he should be proud:

 

Either that or AI has gone, like, 50x farther than I thought it would hahaha