What has happened this year to PAS Ioannina and the downward spiral it has taken, can only be compared with the rescue committee and the fundraisers 20 years ago! Simply, on a financial level, the impasse is not so great to release… a record outside the church (not yet at least…).
We are talking about a ship from which the officers and captains were the first to jump, and the scumbags will be the last to leave! Terrible situations, that is, that do not honor anyone.
And since there is no object of criticism in the competitive part, so unfortunate as the management, technical staff and players have deemed it, today we will focus on Michalis Grigoriou who announced that he is ending his cooperation with the team.
He came 4 months ago to save what he could, but with great surprise we found that lately he has been trying tooth and nail to protect his image with the statements he made and the deification of the world! And possibly, when he said he was shedding the mantle of “special missions” man and reminded us of his past in teams he’s had since the beginning, maybe he already had something in mind.
But let’s take things in order. The 50-year-old technician when he came tried to make some cuts. The team started to look more like a professional team, had a regular coaching staff with distinct roles, tried to activate more roster players and not have 12-13 players in the shirt at home, the team also retired before home matches to a hotel for to get everyone connected and to break the individual “cliques” and he also made a clean-up in the roster, as far as the financial powers of the administration allowed. It was the period when something seemed to change into a deadlocked situation. But unfortunately that’s where the positives ended.
Competitively, things were not going well at all, even if the victory over Asteras Tripoli gave a little extension of life until the transfers were made. And where we had reached the last… border before PAS Ioannina could save the year with Panserraikos and Lamia, Grigoriou comes out and says that they can be delayed a few days, as long as they are such that they will help. In the meantime, there was a rumor about a player arriving in Athens. In fact, we wrote in Ioannina that a player from Argentina has arrived and is undergoing medical tests. Finally, for an unknown reason, the player took the plane and returned to his home country. There was the first transfer frenzy, because even if the player did not come, it was later confirmed by the words of the coach that there was a closed player from Argentina. So, the coach after that fiasco, it was as if he basically agreed to the same thing that happened during Staikos.
It is very funny, however, that some deified Grigoriou because he had allegedly given an ultimatum to the management for transfers. Staikos had also given such “ultimatums” in the summer and the result was that he went to Poland with Kleiman and Begala…
Time passed, it goes without saying that the transfers were not what they should have been and that’s where the excuses started that good players are not coming to the last team. But that’s why PAS took Grigoriou, so that with his prestige he could guarantee salvation and convince managers to send players.
Those who came at last came, then the declarations began that they want time to reach the appropriate level of readiness. Not even Demir who played a week before coming to PAS was considered ready and instead of the ten minutes becoming half an hour, half time and 90 minutes, they ended up being a bench and a platform.
From results in the meantime… zero to the quotient. PAS started the matches well and looked “read” for the opponent, but then the management from the bench did not remind a coach of this vast experience, with the result that results are lost through the hands of the team. Which of course cost money.
Along with the management from the bench, however, something was also happening with the team’s physical condition, which from the 60th minute onwards ran out of strength. Was it the stress that was bending the knees of the players? Was it because something went wrong in summer training? Was it something else? Everyone shifts the blame and we will never know.
And now we reach the point where the team has lost the opportunity to win the matches with OFI, Atromito twice and Panaitolikos and there in between there begins a crowding towards the coach about his own responsibilities, about the transfers and how they happened .K. On the one hand we recognize that he answered everything and that he did not resent the long duration of the interviews, but on the other hand he always put up a firewall that he himself was not a wizard, implying that he received scorched earth, so he did not have much responsibility.
One last thing. People are asking now that everything is lost, to play the little ones and to give opportunities to those who want to stay next year as well. But come on, when Grigoriou came, Mina, Kyrkos, Naoumis, Begala and occasionally some others who left, namely Lolis, Tsiris, usually did individual programs with Mr. Georgoulopoulos and rarely played in doubles. Which means that even if they play now, they will only record participation, because they don’t have a rhythm even from training.
In conclusion, it is legitimate for Mr. Grigoriou to take only his responsibilities, just to remember that Staikos with Durudo as his only assistant failed to win at home against Olympiakos, Panathinaikos, PAOK, AEK and Grigoriou with 5 staff members and 5 transfers did not win Panetoliko, Panserraikos, Lamia, OFI and Atromito.
We don’t see all this now after the holiday. Everything has been written and everything was known. But under no circumstances are we writing them to blame the demotion on Mr. Grigoriou. There is clearly one big excuse that actually removes a very large burden of responsibility and that is the administration with its mistakes. She chose her partners, she chose to rule from Athens, so she bears the brunt of the relegation.
As of course the players who unfortunately did not give even 50% of what they could have a share. If it was stress, bad training, bad atmosphere in the locker room, they know that. We, however, in no way saw the same returns as last year.
P.S.1: There are players who want to stay next year in PAS Ioannina, as long as there is some prospect of returning to the Super League and not to experience something similar to this year and even in a smaller category. The point is to find some management to discuss it while it’s early…
PS 2: There is an intention to sell the players who have contracts for the next year, in order to increase the team’s budget, in case no successor situation is found in the administration. Of course, we won’t be talking about any huge sums, nor about a “combodema” with which the goal of the championship will be set. It will simply be an attempt to make the year more comfortable, in case someone is found to take over the team in the meantime.
PS3: Georgoulopoulos-Anthimiadis coach-assistant duo for the last two games, although in case the Christovasilides remain in charge, it is possible to see them on the bench in Super League 2 as well.
