What is it? An Athenian derby
Who should care? Olympiakos fans wanting to figure out who’s NOT going to challenge for the title, Djibril Cisse fans (not many of you out there I suppose…), people who hate Kostas Katsouranis (AEK fans and just about anyone who knows anything about football)
Will it be a cracking match? Absolutely not – these two have produced a few snooze-fests in recent times…

One headline in Greece described this as a “Derby without stars” and given that both AEK Athens and Panathinaikos will be without key attacking players, you wouldn’t disagree with that statement.

For AEK Athens, the irrepressible Ignacio Scocco and experienced Nikos Lyberopoulos are missing through injury, as are teen prodigy Sotiris Ninis and bullish winger Sebastian Leto for Panathinaikos.

It’s hard to see which players will be missed by their respective sides more. For AEK, Argentine talent Scocco has been their go-to man in derby matches since his arrival at the club, recently scoring a stunning double away against Aris in a 4-0 win and last season memorably doing the same in a 2-1 away win against Olympiakos. Lyberopoulos meanwhile calls upon years of experience as a goal-scorer in both Greece and abroad, having returned to the club where he is adored in order to lead them through difficult times; his ability to score crucial goals and provide a link between midfield and attack is unmatched by any of his teammates.

Perennial Manchester United and Real Madrid target Sotiris Ninis – or so the Greek media would like to believe – is the bright spark in what is a slightly old squad, widely regarded as his country’s most exciting prospect. His creativity was missed in midweek as the Greens played out a drab goalless draw with Rubin Kazan in the UEFA Champions League, as was the drive of Sebastian Leto out wide. The Liverpool man has been a revelation since his fall-out with Olympiakos prompted him to make a controversial move to their hated rivals, helping to inspire them to a domestic double.

Traianos Dellas (Can’t run) vs Djibril Cisse (Can sprint)

Logic would suggest that Panathinaikos won’t be reeling quite as much given the depth of international quality in their playing roster, still able to call upon the likes of Djibril Cisse, who has already banged in five goals against the Greek Super League’s defenders this season after top-scoring last campaign. Yet their injury list extends to his fellow countryman Sidney Govou and the experienced Giourkas Seitaridis, which further dents the preparation of manager Nikos Nioplias.

AEK face a defensive reshuffle with rising star Kosta Manolas, the experienced and versatile Christos Patsatzoglou, usual right-back Sanel Jahic and club stalwart Nikos Georgeas all ruled out, leaving the ageing legs of Traianos Dellas and the uncovincing Christian Nasuti as a central defensive pairing, whom I think could be in for a disastrous evening against the aforementioned Cisse.

I’d use Panathinaikos’ unconvincing display in Europe in midweek as evidence that they’ve lost the attacking mojo that characterized their domestic and continental campaigns last season, though AEK faired hardly any better against Anderlecht in midweek. You get the sense though that Nioplias is feeling the pressure in the PAO hot-seat, having offered his resignation at least once this season, while new AEK boss Manolo Jimenez made a bright start against Aris.

The Spaniard will be no stranger to derby atmospheres after his long association with Sevilla and he handled what was a tricky opening test at the Kleanthis Vikelidis with aplomb; this though is an altogether different prospect against a team who already boasted a far stronger line-up before AEK were beset by injury problems.

In terms of key men for the home side, Rafik Djebbour has looked energetic as the resident lone man up-front all season, netting three times in the league thus far. Brazilian Leonardo can on his day do damage from just about anywhere outside the penalty area, while from the snippets of the Aris match it seemed as though Pantelis Kafes, Papa Bouba Diop and the frustrating Grigoris Makos might be forming an encouraging midfield partnership.

Though lacking the sheer intensity and hatred evoked by the Olympiakos-Panathinaikos match-up, this match is hugely important to the title race and neither team can afford to lose it.

As the Greens walked away from the Camp Nou with a goal and thus an improvement on their last visit to Cataluña, they’ll know that they contributed in no small part to a disastrous start to their campaign but one that was entirely predictable.

For starters, for all his talent Nikos Nioplias is inexperienced on such a stage and it showed with the way he set out his team; sitting deep but not deep enough at times, each of his players didn’t seem to have a specific set of instructions to follow, aimlessly wondering around their own half and chasing shadows.

Yes, Barcelona are probably the best team in Europe in terms of movement off the ball but Pana made it incredibly easy by tracking virtually none of their runners into the final third and allowing a back-three of Puyol, the weakened Pique and a suspect Abidal to play out of defence with maximum comfort (I say back three because Daniel Alves played virtually as a right winger throughout the match).

I’m not saying play with three men up front but at least use as many when launching counter-attacks; the only time Djibril Cisse had a teammate remotely close to him inside Barcelona’s half was when Sidney Govou latched onto his genius back-heel volley and side-footed home for a lead that lasted only a couple of minutes.

If that wasn’t evidence enough that the best route to victory was via the amount of goals scored then what exactly was Nioplias waiting for? A simple clearance from the goalkeeper caused problems, so why not push on and really put some pressure on and expose recent insecurities?

The response to that goal and the performance from the La Liga outfit in general was predictable. Guardiola’s men were always going to add width to their play after the Hércules disaster and did so effectively, while Pana’s back four weren’t helped out at all by what were essentially three holding midfielders, the worst of which was the anonymous Kostas Katsouranis who was as bad on this occasion for his club as he has been for the national team.

It’s one thing to sit deep and get 10 men behind the ball but it’s quite another to do that in the name of executing a rather more sophisticated plan, something that was sorely missing on this occasion and a mistake which Pana dare not make again as they look to recover – something they are more than capable of doing.

PS. The performance by Barcelona was described rather colourfully by one Greek commentator as being “Playstation football” to give you an idea of the gulf in class

Of course, if you travel over to Ramzi’s colourful and quite outstanding Barcelona blog you’ll find – along with a beautifully titled match preview and insightful review of the Hercules game, all with some equally fascinating links within them – that things aren’t all that rosy in Cataluña, where the familiar square ball- square ball – square ball – square ball – square ball – incisive through ball into the boxfinished (supposedly) by David Villa, game plan hasn’t been ripping teams apart lately.

Indeed Hércules walked away from the Camp Nou with three points at the weekend in a match that I watched in order to forget the troubles of my beloved Newcastle United; it puts things into perspective when a squad that is significantly more talented suffers a home defeat by the same scoreline only a couple of hours later.

Now aside from the fact that there are obvious signs for all you prophets out there – I challenge anyone who reads this to find a Nostradamus prediction that can be misinterpreted to suit this match as you’ll probably find it – with Hercules of course being a Greek demigod and sharing the name with the side who most recently enjoyed success against Pep Guardiola’s men, there is legitimate tactical logic to suggest Panathinaikos could walk away with a big, big result here.

I for one have never been totally convinced by the aesthetically-pleasing Barca who to be quite frank, aren’t always that aesthetically pleasing and know how to grind out results in unconvincing fashion (it’s not as if they outplayed Manchester United when they lifted the UEFA Champions league trophy a little while ago and indeed probably could have been down one or two-nil early on in the match).

But I feel I’m in the minority, certainly in my own country where certain resident Australian analysts have built shrines dedicated to ‘the Barcelona way’ of playing football. In the name of being anti-social I’ve consciously chosen to go against the trend and root for the bad guys at times when it comes to watching the blaugrana.

In any case as a fan of Greek football I’m going to be right behind Panathinaikos despite my allegiance to AEK Athens in a couple of hours; I find no logic in not supporting fellow Greek teams on the continent regardless of the rivalry taken up domestically for the simple reason that we Greeks can’t afford to be picky when it comes to having representatives in Europe (usually numbering one or none these days in terms of the UEFA Champions League).

Regardless of all the recent hyper-analysis of Barca’s failings and flaws in their system, it’s hard to see Pana getting anything out of this match for the sheer fact that they’ll have a back-line with both Jean-Alain Boumsong (pictured) and Loukas Vyntra in it. If David Villa can’t score against what must be two of the worst defenders in Europe then he might as well retire…

Inter Milan provided the blueprint for success away against Barca in last season’s Champions League and it was an approach that was largely mirrored by Hércules at the weekend. Nikos Nioplias, a rookie manager but a talented one, would be wise to adopt a similar system but is surely aware that his side are rather more limited than the reigning European champions when it comes to defensive quality. So that aforementioned blueprint is probably about as useful as this one, the meaning of which won’t be lost on all you Mallrats fans out there:

PS. I’ll start to dedicate this section of The Offside to monitoring Greek performances in Europe if nothing else in an attempt to keep it alive, given the conspicuous absence of my fellow bloggers around here. I feel as though I’m doing a quite admirable job at flying the flag alone *applauds himself whilst still holding metaphorical flag*

As an Olympiacos fan, I usually mind my own business when it comes to these sort of cultural affairs, sticking to the war of words that lives on between Olympiacos and its fiercest rivals. At the same time I could be seen as the biggest perpetrator of the whole ABE (Anyone But England) conspiracy. I guess in this case it’s ABMU (Anyone But Manchester United).

“Why?” you ask. Well, I’ll tell ya. Living in a country that doesn’t find much interest in football (Canada, here we they call it soccer), it’s very rare to find somebody who has the same passion for the sport as you do. Sure there are a few gems hidden in the Great White North, but for the most part, there is a large sense of ignorance for the ‘haters’ of the sport.

Seeing as hockey takes prominence in this country, sports such as soccer are seen as a grassroots game due to the lack of rough-stuff in the game — barbaric? Yep. So, when a World Cup rolls around, or even just a regular time of the European club season, the arrogance and ignorance spills over like the oil spill causing environmental havoc at the time of writing in the States.

This ignorance leads to making uneducated comments seen as a cardinal seen by the true fans of the beautiful game, not to mention the whole bandwagon effect that can quickly torch any friendship. The once-British influence on Canada has in turn seen a wide-variety of Brits make the leap across the Atlantic Ocean and into Canada. Thus, for starters, the popularity of Manchester United is relatively strong regardless of the non-soccer folk.

It doesn’t help the less-informed folk will then choose one of the more well-known teams, so if it’s not Barcelona or Real Madrid, it’s most likely a team from the most-watched league, the English Premier League. This is where Manchester United takes the cake, and it’s rather ridiculous supporting a team when you know just one player. It used to be Cristiano Ronaldo, and now it’s generally Wayne Rooney who gets the support.

So, if these reports about Ninis are true, and should the most-hyped name in the Greek game move to Old Trafford, I will still have to cheer against Greece’s biggest hopes on the international stage at every chance I get.

Sorry Sotiri, but local pride is on the line…

A sixty-something priest who belongs to a Thessaloniki parish, ‘Papa PAOK’ has unfortunately been demoted for his passion and ordered not to attend any more supporter gatherings. Such an obstruction of justice and basic human rights I have not seen since…well…whenever it happened last on a grand scale worthy enough of being turned into a Hollywood blockbuster (Roland Emmerich’s The Patriot will probably have to do…)

It has spawned the creation of a Facebook page calling for his freedom which this writer has joined in the name of justice. Fans of the club have hilariously described their terrace hero as a man who carries out “social and spiritual work of the Church on behalf of the people” and accused the Orthodox Church of a “fascist and reactionary approach”.

Priest Christos is the subject of a few Youtube videos (you’ll find one at the bottom of this page) and appears to have a deity-like standing among the club’s notoriously psychotic fans, who even by their high standards of general anarchy have outdone themselves on this occasion.

Indeed, fans of Olympiakos and AEK Athens will quickly want to forget a season that saw Panathinaikos win the double and a resurgent PAOK steal a UEFA Champions League chance from under the noses of the Athenian clubs, who according to reports coming out of Greece will next season begin to feel the pinch of the country’s current economic crisis. Gone reportedly are the days where Olympiakos would splash out lavish sums of money in the knowledge that there would be some sort of return on their investment through the refuge of the UEFA Champions League group stages; the associated financial windfall (assuming they qualify) will now go to PAOK, a club who were in a dire financial situation themselves before being rescued by the presidency of Euro 2004-winning captain Theos Zagorakis.

AEK Athens have assumed the role of the resident financial basket-case in their stead, without a genuine leader and not inconsiderable debts that are stifling any forward direction that the current group of players might want to move forward in. There are whispers of a summer move from Hull City want-away Geovanni but can AEK really afford another expensive foreigner in the Rivaldo mould? (An investment upon which this writer feels there was no tangible return) A summer fire-sale might see the departure of pillars Ismael Blanco and Daniel Majstorovic, while the future of Argentine prodigy Ignacio Scocco remains uncertain, as does that of manager Dusan Bajevic. The latest report read by yours truly was that both AEK and Olympiakos will be restricted to signing players on free transfers over the next few months as football clubs begin to feel the effects of the Greek economy’s implosion. With spending like this is it any wonder?

Panathinaikos will likely be the ones to come out of this season with something to spend ahead of next given they’ll be enjoying the benefits of the UEFA Champions League group stages, though their president Nikos Pateras recently called a re-election at the club around roughly the same time that Sokratis Kokkalis invited new board members to Olympiakos. The latter’s decision is probably borne out of the current financial climate and Olympiakos’ disastrous season – though it is perhaps a sign that the real world (one in which living beyond your means does indeed catch up to you) is catching up on Greek football.

PS. Watch out all you tax-evading Greek footballers, while there’s an interesting piece her about the breakdown of nationalities in some of Greece’s biggest clubs – and the general prominence of foreign players across the Greek Super League.

Olympiakos will begin the play-offs in first place with four points, PAOK with three, AEK Athens with 1 and Aris with none, each team to play each other twice. The team that finishes top of the table will clinch a potentially lucrative spot in the UEFA Champions League Qualifiers next season with the other three set to parachute into the Europa League.

It represents a potentially tricky situation for Olympiakos, who aside from losing the title to bitter rivals Panathinaikos this year are now also in danger of missing out on a chance to compete in the Champions League. PAOK are logically their main contenders after an impressive season that saw them pipped at the last to second spot while AEK Athens’ form after the New Year could see them emerge as a dark horse for the bright lights of Europe’s premier club competition, though recent in-fighting could again be their Achilles’ heel.

The carrot of the UEFA Champions League group stages should be enough motivation for all four sides though, with the financial perils of AEK an obvious motivation for the cash windfall of an appearance and PAOK’s continued resurrection into a giant of Greek football set to be aided by the prestige of qualification. Aris remain the undoubted outsiders but are entirely capable of producing slick, troubling football for their considerably larger rivals.

Logic would suggest that the home ground advantage of each side – or rather, how they utilize it – will be crucial to the outcome of the mini-league, in which case Olympiakos’ recent defeats to PAOK and AEK Athens stand as a worrying sign ahead of what could be a particularly tight race. In that respect Aris’ traditionally hostile Kleanthis Vikelidis Stadium could represent the turning point between the other three teams, where any of the other three teams could concede ground to each other.

In terms of key players, Olympiakos boast World Cup-bound Greek international Vasilis Torosidis, who has emerged as a legitimate match-winner when it comes to derbies and who will certainly edge closer to an inevitable exit from Greece if UEFA Champions League football isn’t secured next season. Hungarian prodigy Krisztian Nemeth remains the X-Factor for AEK with the on-loan Liverpool man having impressed sporadically this season, while PAOK boast classy goal-poacher Zlatan Muslimovic and Aris Argentine revelation Javier Campora, their top scorer this season.

The draw:

Wednesday, April 28

AEK vs PAOK
Aris vs Olympiakos

Sunday, May 2

PAOK vs Aris
Olympiakos vs AEK

Wednesday, May 5

AEK vs Aris
PAOK vs Olympiakos

Sunday, May 9

Aris vs AEK
Olympiakos vs PAOK

Wednesday, May 12

Olympiakos vs Aris
PAOK vs AEK

Sunday, May 16

Aris vs PAOK
AEK vs Olympiakos

Finally Djibril Cisse and co. managed to tie up a title that only a few weeks ago they seemed to so comically have handed back to their fierce rivals with an utterly predictable 1-0 home defeat in the only match on the Greek football calender that currently matters outside of the national team, though Olympiacos’ general shambles and conspicuous lack of…a…ermm…manager…has sought to add a little bit of variety to the trophy-lifting ceremony at the end of this season, where red and white will not be the dominant colour and where Maradona probably won’t be joining in on the celebrations (personally, I wouldn’t put it past him to rock up with a Cuban and Panathinaikos jersey).

Goals from Cisse and Sotiris Ninis – the teen prodigy who appears to be coming of age just ahead of the World Cup in South Africa – wrestled the Greek Super League title out of the hands of Olympiacos, Iraklis the sacrificial lambs as president Nikos Pateras announced the creation of a five-year platform for a club starved of success in recent times: though his future remains uncertain and will supposedly be determined at the next general meeting. Manager Nikos Nioplias seems to have his future tied up with that of Pateras, who has recommended the rookie trainer be given another year at the helm of the club (certainly it would provide a far greater test of his abilities, given the manner in which he essentially piggy-backed off the work of Henk Ten Cate this season – and indeed almost reversed it at the climax).

The fact remains that as it stands this is the first Panathinaikos team in many-a-year that can genuinely claim to be a match for the squad depth and quality that still exists at Olympiacos: forget managerial merry-go-rounds and trigger-happy presidents, at the end of the day the current champions of Greece simply had the most well-rounded team and the best striker in the country at the moment in Cisse. Football, after all, is a game decided by goals. Championships by logic are similarly won by them and goals Panathinaikos had in spades at the crucial moments this season.

Cisse’s capture has proven a masterstroke but the real question is whether his impact will have a lasting legacy for the club and for Greek football. Olympiacos to my understanding remain Greece’s most powerful, well-backed and well-financed club and can just as easily buy the title back next season by emptying out half of Argentina as they end coaching careers and hand out severance packages.

For the good of Greek football, that expected backlash must be met with clever investment and player-pulling from the likes of Panathinaikos, PAOK and the shadow-of-a-former-club that is AEK Athens so that the Greek Super League is not again monopolized.

As you may have heard last week, American soccer stars Freddy Adu and Eddie Johnson have joined Greek side Aris on loan deals from Benfica and Fulham respectively. The duo joined the club late last week and immediately took up training sessions with the rest of the squad, but didn’t feature in a 4-2 derby win over Iraklis on the weekend.

It’s a huge move for the Greek club, but more importantly for Johnson and Adu. While the latter is likely a lock for the US team this summer in South Africa, Johnson’s lack of consistent appearances for the national team is an indication that the former Kansas City Wizard will have to light Thessaloniki ablaze (before the fans do) in order to crack the World Cup roster – which bears plenty of competition through marquee strikers Kenny Cooper and Jozy Altidore.

Even though the World Cup seems to be the target for both players, the goal for Aris right is a spot in Europe next season. Those plans, however, are on hold at the moment as the Thessaloniki outfit faces Asteras Tripolis in the Greek Cup on Wednesday. Super League responsibilities return to the priority on the weekend when Hector Raul Cuper’s travel to face PAS Giannina on Sunday.

Cue two rather embarrassing losses to the remaining Greek giants on the European stage, Panathinaikos crashing to a 3-1 home defeat against Galatasaray and AEK thrashed 4-0 at Goodison Park by a struggling, understrength Everton outfit.

While Panathinaikos fans will question their club’s grandiose spending in the transfer market during the off-season, with so many, many millions of euros yielding not one proven centre-back – a crucial ingredient in any top side, in any league, domestic or continental – AEK fans will simply need to accept that they are reflecting of the comparatively poor standard and pedestrian nature of the Greek domestic game.

An ordinary English Premier League side playing largely in 2nd or 3rd gear brushed one of Greece’s ‘Big Three’ aside with little effort, while a competent but unspectacular Turkish side exposed defensive frailties with worrying ease (though the Greens at least looked impressive going forward).

It’s been yet another reality check for the Greek Super League and all concerned this week…