The “Shamrock” remained below expectations in its first home game for the domestic competitions of the season. A draw without goals was the result of the duel against Levadiakos held in “Ap. Nicolaidis” stadium for the 2nd match day of the Super League Greece championship.
Maybe in its worst appearance for 2017, after a 0-0 draw, the trainer of Panathinaikos Marinos Ouzounidis commented obviously “we were lucky we didn’t lose”. From the first half, already, the tough defensive line of the guests seemed ready to create a big trouble to Panathinaikos’ deployment. The “Greens” had many of their players absent and the fatigue was accumulated; the 11 starting players didn’t seem to have the necessary chemistry between them. There were very few chances and the final attempts were implemented under a lot of pressure.
Any opportunity which could occur after the entrance of Chavez in the pitch, in the beginning of the second period, became hopeless due to the expulsion of Evangelou in the 49th minute. Playing with 10 from then on, things worsened for Panathinaikos. The lines were disconnected, the strength was limited and the general appearance of the “Shamrock” was below average, being unable to threaten their opponents till the end of the match. They were even letting some chances to the guest team which wasn’t lucky enough to score. Both Yousuf and Brandao lost some easy chances to score against Vlachodimos’ goalposts and this was the main reason why the match ended in a 0-0- draw.
After this second loss of points in a raw the “Greens” are literally and figuratively in a zero. Due to the point removal sanction, coming from the previous season, this loss of points seems extremely severe in this very moment.
Line-ups:
Panathinaikos: Vlachodimos, Coulibaly, Evangelou (49’ exp.), Koutroumbis, Kolovetsios, Zeca, Lod, Altman (67’ Johansson), Luciano, Cabezas (46’ Chavez), Molins (72’ Chatzigiovannis)
Levadiakos: Epasi, Tripotseris, Leonardo, Medi, Tsambouris, Mitropoulos (85′ Kaltsas), Niasse, Zaradoukas, Yiakoumakis (86′ Kapsaskis), Yousuf, Bradao (77′ Vassiliou)
