Where to now for O Istorikos?

It is looking likely that this forthcoming Greek Super League season will be a particularly tough one, for one of the oldest and most historic teams in all of Greek Football, Panionios.

Various issues are casting a huge shadow over the club and they are threatening to derail their season before it even begins.

The most immediate issue, is the fact that Panionios will begin their 2019/20 Super League campaign on the backfoot, starting the season on -6 points. A punishment handed down by the Hellenic Football Federation for Panionios, “not meeting the conditions for a license to compete in the Championship”, by virtue of the debts they owe to various entities.

In addition to this setback, Panionios have also been hit with a transfer embargo, similar to the one suffered by Panathinaikos.

During this current transfer window, Panionios will only be eligible to recruit 1 player Greek or Foreign who is over the age of 23. However, Panionios during this same period, will be able to sign an unlimited number of Greek players, who are under the age of 23. 

During the next transfer window in January, Panionios will only be allowed to sign 1 player over the age of 23.

Financially, the club is also not in great shape, but this is also nothing new for Panionios. There have been many stories written over a long period of time, about the dire economic situation Panionios find themselves in and even predicting its demise.

Despite all this, in recent seasons, Panionios have continuedto compete at a high level and finish at the higher end of the table (5th in 2015/16, 5th in 2016/17, 6th in 2017/18 and 6th in 2018/19). The players though, who have helped them stay competitive, continue to leave for greener pastures, year after year.

Players like; Tasos Bakasetas, Lazaros Lamprou, Sokratis Dioudis, Spyros Risvanis, Giorgos Masouras and in this off-season Srdjan Spiridonovic, and Fiorin Durmishaj have all come and gone. A problem Panionios seems to encounter year after year.

One thing that Panionios have never been poor in, is developing and bringing through good young Greek talent, see the players already mentioned, as well as the likes of Kostas Nestoridis, Nikos Anastopoulos, Dimitris Saravakos, Thomas Mavros, Spyros Marangos, Takis Fyssas, Leonidas Vokolos, Grigoris Makos as examples, just to name a few.Panionios will need to and be hoping to find a few more gems.

Given this ray of hope, the storm clouds will still hover over Panionios next season. 

You would have to assume, that with the restructuring of the Greek football pyramid and the reduction to 14 teams in the Super League, it may be more difficult than ever to haul ones self out of a points deduction hole.

There will be less games and theoretically, less teams would mean a fewer amount of spots and more quality players concentrated throughout the fewer amount of teams in Super League.

Needless to say, the best hope for Panionios would be to attack the opening rounds, to try and get themselves into the positive as soon as possible, as the longer it takes for Panionios to get themselves out of the negative, the much harder it will be to survive relegation.

An interesting season ahead for Panionios.

Hellas Football