Panathinaikos Summer Preparation Hopes 2021

Panathinaikos Summer Preparation Hopes 2021

By Antonios Theodosis

 

With the international tournaments now over, club football hype is officially back on, and in recent days we have seen transfer news picking up momentum, summer preparations getting more coverage, and friendly games being played.

 

For Panathinaikos fans, we are in a very familiar position here in the summer. Fresh off of the sacking of a previous coach, the new one, Ivan Jovanovic is already here and doing his work, and we are being linked with new players with a couple of new faces already signed and wearing the green jersey.

 

After a less than stellar season last year, expectations amongst Panathinaikos fans are varied. Some are optimistic, a larger portion feel the opposite, while the rest have essentially become indifferent and resigned themselves to leaving fate up to the football gods.

 

Personally, I find myself stuck between the optimistic crowd and the crowd leaving it all up to the football gods. It seems that in the last few years when expectations are high at Panathinaikos, the team comes up short leaving the fans bitterly disappointed.

 

I want to focus on the here and now though instead of purely focusing on what could go good or bad during the season. I feel that it's important to discuss what I would like to see from the team in the summer period before the season officially begins, that way I can formulate a better understanding of where I can realistically see this team going when the ball gets rolling, pun intended.

 

Transfers:

 

Let’s address the most exciting part of the summer in football first, transfers. From what we saw last season the team really lacked quality when it came to the full back positions. Yohan Mollo was a nice surprise, but the Frenchman was not naturally a right-back and at times the Panathinaikos faithful would have to endure seeing opposing wingers attack the inexperienced defender, though he put on a valiant effort much to our appreciation.

 

His counterpart on the left, Juankar, was not too much better either. The ex-La Liga wingback was at times caught out in no man’s land throughout the season and it was apparent that the team should possibly look to strengthen these positions.

 

The club addressed the right-back position rather swifty with the addition of Kotsiras from Asteras Tripolis. Without having played a game yet for the greens, I do believe that this was a good decision as the team now has an experienced and talented player at the right-back spot, one of the weaker areas in the squad last year.

 

Still the left-back position remains untouched, with Juankar remaining as the starting player there. I do think that when he is in form, Juankar can put in solid performances for the team, especially when he charges forward. Although he had his moments last season, I trust that Jovanovic will make a fair assessment on both Juankar and his rotational counterpart Chatzitheodoridis. Though I would prefer Juankar be used as the rotational left-back and the club bring in someone else for the starting role, I do understand that there are other areas that need to be addressed first.

 

Just yesterday we saw the addition of a new number six at PAO, Ruben Perez, who was reportedly the manager’s choice. The acquisition has come with mixed feelings amongst the Panathinaikos fans, but I think this addition is a good one. The coach fully had a say in bringing him in and he was in the top flight of Spanish football just two seasons ago. If anything, he will serve as a great mentor to Alexandropoulos, who will possibly be his partner in the midfield of the preferred 4-2-3-1 Jovanovic famously adores.

 

The two biggest issues I hope to be addressed this summer however are at the striker position and center back position.

 

Both Federico Macheda and Carlitos were disappointing to say the least last season. The team struggled to find the back of the net in the early days of the season, having to rely on penalties to narrowly salvage a point away to OFI, as well as relying on set piece goals to bail the team out. This summer I would prefer to see both forwards moved on and see someone else brought in either as a rotational option or as the new starter. With that said, Fotis Ioannidis showed signs of promise last season and I don’t think I am alone in saying that I prefer to see him playing over the other two strikers in the summer preparations.

 

Though the goal scoring was an issue at times, I feel that the team’s Achilles heel was its defense. They went on a solid run after the Christmas break, however after the derby win against Olympiakos the team’s defensive weaknesses were exploited many times, especially in the playoffs. This was exacerbated further when the team’s best defender Bart Schenkeveld sat out with injury. The team should look to bring in another center back this summer to pair with Bart, as Velez is a solid rotational player, but I fear that he was a bit inconsistent last season and did not have the best chemistry with Bart.

 

Ivan Jovanovic:

 

It is always exciting when a new manager takes over a team. Fresh faces, new ideas, the natural rise of optimism that the team will finally get it together, but at Panathinaikos this is an all too familiar situation.

Ivan Jovanovic however is a good, experienced manager, who knows the ins and outs of Greek football. If he can give the team an identity early on during these summer preparations it will only serve to benefit the club. We saw last year’s summer preparations did not go so well, with the team struggling to find an identity and looking disjointed out on the pitch. Addressing issues early on will be key for Jovanovic’s side so that they can avoid the aforementioned issues.

 

One big thing that I found to be a positive so far this summer with Jovanovic is that he is solely in charge of bringing in the players he wants. In essence, he is building his team by selecting the players he wants, as we saw with Ruben Perez. This is going to be important this summer because in the past, it always seemed as if the manager and the technical directors at the club did their own thing and did not really communicate much when it came to transfers. Normally, with a club whose budget is small, it would be a good thing to have the manager’s preference rather than strictly going with what the technical director wants. We saw this issue arise with Giorgos Donis and Xavi Roca. For the first time it seems that a manager will be able to fully select the players he wants to fit his own footballing philosophy and that is a key component this summer.

 

Finally, Jovanovic’s other big task this summer will have to be with how he deals with any sorts of divisions within the squad. We read multiple reports last year about locker room bust-ups, arguments, and a sense of disunity within the squad. In order to prepare the team for success, the manager is going to have to make sure this team is all for one and one for all.

 

With all of that said, it sounds like I am asking for a lot, but after the season we had last year, I learned that so many little things can contribute to a disappointing run. Let’s gather behind our players and the new manager and support them this summer, but I urge you all to not get too excited too early, nor too disappointed too early as with Panathinaikos you just never know.

Hellas Football 

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