OFI vs AEK

[Dikefale11]

OFI vs AEK

Date - Saturday, 29th September 2018

Venue - Theodoros Vardinogiannis Stadium, Heraklion

Competition - Superleague Greece

Round - 5

Time - 20:30 (Greece time)

[Dikefale11]

I think its time to stop playing players out of position.

Mantalos has shown that he is not even half the player he is on the wing than he is at CAM. Same with Bakasetas.

We have been extremely unfortunate that 2 of the wingers we brought in during the summer have been injured thus far (Boye & Albanis) and Gianniotas only now being match fit and that posiyion being one that we lack the most players in.

I dont think anybody knows what injured Boye but he seems to be on the mend. Will be severely lacking in match fitness which is another issue.

Albanis too. Sooner we have these players available we can play our key players in there rightful position. Mantalos & Bakasetas dont have the speed for the wing.

Either way a lot of people are losing the head already because we lost to Ajax & PAOK. We are 4 games into the season people need to calm down. We were unlucky yesterday with the dokaria and the defenders brain lapse. We were also unlucky to concede so early in the 2nd vs Ajax. Both games were away from home too so some fans need to take a step back.

We all know what should have been done over the summer regarding transfers but we have to go on with what we have at the moment.

This is a big game not only points wise but morale wise, we need to get the win in a difficult ground before the big one vs Benfica 3 days later and get the confidence back.

[Amorgos]

I agree Dikefale, some very over the top comments. Some key things though that need to start happening

As you said, get Mantalos in the CAM position. He’s in good form, he has done ok on the wing but has a lot more to offer in his natural position. How and why Ouzo & Skibbe play Bakasetas on the wing I’ll never know.

Gianniotas, get him on there and Lopez can also do so in the GSL at least

This is a big game in the scheme of things, we need to win

[AEK433]

The problem Ouzo is having and to degree Jimenez had, is how do you fit Mantalos, Bakasetas and Livaja in the same 11. If Mantalos goes CAM, Livaja will need to go ST, Ponce drops to the bench as does Bakasetas.
The only way to get around this is to play a narrow 4-3-2-1 ie AC Milan 2007 where Kaka and Seedorf were behind Inzaghi.

[Dikefale11]

You can throw Klona into that mix too! It is a problem but a problem you dont mind having. A problem would be not having them. It is unfortunate as they all produce. Bakasetas has actually become a pretty integral player for us. He scores, is one of the few players on the team that can shoot and is good in the link up play. He plays best as a 2nd striker. Problem is so does Livaja and Klona. One is arguably our best player the other our top scorer thus far.

[Val]

Nothing complicated here. The team is weaker at the back and has less goal potential in attack, whilst ouzo seems blind to this. When you dont score, you will most likely concede at the other end especially against good opposition.

In the bigger games, ouzo needs to be more conservative. He doesn't have vranjes, so a high line wont do unless he wants to put bakakis at CB. Oikonomou is only good when the team is sitting and protected. But don't expect ouzo to thrive in organizing his defense. This will come down to positional IQ. For all of kourbelis and zecas tenacity and workrate, they often ventured too far from that area in front of the center backs. And for balls in the box, moledo was often too reactive and we were screaming for a henriksen that can cover well. Instead we had the mindless koutroubi. Guy still haunts my dreams. Disgrace that he has played at two top greek clubs.

Anyway ouzo still came away with wins at both oaka and toumpa playing in this fashion. For the 3-2 win against aek, he played a reactive 4-2-3-1. Klonaridis played the highest as a poacher. Obviously very quick and can finish. In fact probably the best finisher you guys have.

The rest of the attack looked like this,

---------------klona
-------------berg
m'poku--------------villa

Dont see why you cant try this:

---------------klona
-------------livaja
Giannortas-------mantalos

Dont freak out about mantalos on the wing. Just like villafanez, he is there to retain the ball and wait for his teammates to make runs ahead before feeding them. That way you dont burn him unlike giannortas whereby you will look to feed the ball on his flank. Matos likes to get forward, why not exploit the space here. Mind you I'm looking for a guy that can link up with livaja. I dont know who else you guys have.

Now the difference is obviously berg. He has the IQ and goals livaja doesn't have, at least not yet. Both can distribute and are good on the ball. If livaja adds goals to his game, he's a star.

So although the set up doesn't have as much goal potential as ouzo had at pao, it's what I would opt for in a derby situation assuming you want to pick a formation of this kind.

For the record I think Jimenez had you guys looking good in these type of games, where that extra man at the back proved telling.

[Damianos]

Simple, need to get the 3 points before Benfica and Oly.

I agree with Dikefale. People are overreacting. We've known the whole time what we've got to work with and that we aren't as strong as last season. We're well placed (CL and 3w, 1l) considering). I only saw highlights but thought we looked good against PAOK, if somewhat unlucky.

The Lambro goal was one of those things, stupid goal, Vranjes did it in Europa last season.

Must win v OFI and put on a good performance v Benfica (they've lost 7 CL games in a row).

I don't expect us to win the league with this roster, everyone should see that and not overreact. Plus, it's a long season, Toumba is a hard place to play at!

[Amorgos]

Precisely. Also to Lambropoulos’s defense (pun intended lol) he’s been good for a while. Makes 1 mistake and all of a sudden he’s very average.

Lets get the win here and move forward

[Nikod]

What’s frustrating is that we had a team that could’ve retained the league and done a solid job in the CL. But Melissanidis managed to lose our best players (and our coach) and not replace them.

this team clearly doesn’t have the quality we did last year and it’s not helped that the squad is so unbalanced with so many CAMs and so few natural wingers and strikers

[Original Sydney]

On another note our fans have once again being stopped from going to this game also.

You got to laugh about that as PAOK has their fans there last week. And I bet Oly will have fans there when they play.

This always happens to us, Paok and Oly had fans at Panionios and once again we won’t.

[JVC]

I'm thinking Meli is using CL money to cover costs for the new stadium, and that's understandable I would do the same....you can't build Rome in one day. Look for Meli to spend more after moving in.

[Amorgos]

Alef out injured for this...

[Dikefale11]

Yeah looks like Cosic will be starting as CM

[Dikefale11]

No Livaja with a slight knock or Oiko who is being rested.

[Amorgos]

Yeah looks like Cosic will be starting as CM

I seen that... we're fucked...