The plan at Olympiakos worked again: One, two, three became the key phase! – Kostas Nikolakopoulos

· One the prisoner: o Olympic does not determine his fate in the title fight. Even five wins to make it in his own remaining five games, if the AEK wins three of their four games (assuming they lose to Olympiakos), takes the title on a tie.

· Actually the Olympic determines its fate only for the 3rd place, which guarantees a European ticket for the new season, in the sense that it still has a derby with PAOK, but here again Olympiacos is handicapped by PAOK. Because, he is one point behind him and has a worse program than him PAOKwhich has the three other big ones in Toumba, plus Lamia away, while Olympiacos has PAOK and PAO away and AEK at home, as well as Lamia.

· What his team has accomplished Mendiliber, with its three wins (Aris 3-0, Lamia 5-0, PAOK 2-1) in the last three playoff games, is to stay alive in a race from which even the first may result, but even fourth place! Realistically, Olympiacos is in the worst position of all! Because, above all, they are behind everyone in the standings, five or six points behind Panathinaikos and AEK. Thus, the fact that all three have two away derbies does not favor him. The same PAOK and PAO. AEK Olympiacos and PAOK. The PAO of AEK and PAOK. And it also has Mars in Harilaou…

· Plus, we don’t know how much the two big games with her will cost him Aston Villa for his semi-finals Conference League, immediately before and immediately after Easter. If they will do well for him, so that they give him a chance for the three tight derbies at the end. If they will bring him losses from injuries etc. The good thing, however, is that he showed Mendiliber both in Lamia, and especially yesterday with PAOK, that he keeps the whole roster alert! Even Vezo, who came on in the 93rd minute, was in time and performed three operations while playing four minutes!

· Otherwise, for the victory over him PAOK to refer you to my article yesterday, at noon before the match: I had written it down, the omens were with Olympic. And never underestimate omens…

· Olympiacos won because they may not have had some super standouts, but they worked as a team. Mediliber’s plan was as always simple and clear. As with her Fenerbahce in the 3-2 in Karaiskakis the plan was “press high, steal, create phases”, as with Fenerbahce in the 0-1 in Istanbul the plan was “we go out on the counter-attack and take advantage of the set-pieces”, so now in the 2- 1 with him PAOK was, “we pass from behind, to the back of the PAOK defense for him Navarro who is faster than his stoppers”.

· So, the first time the Kini found him Navarro at the back of the defence, Navarro scored but was clearly offside…the second time the Tzolakis (!) found Navarro at the back of the defence, Navarro again scored in a 4-4 with Kotarski, but he was in a completely offside position and the goal was disallowed on a VAR indication, while the ref had gone for the cross…for the third time The Retsos found Navarro at the back of the defense and o Koulierakis he couldn’t bear it (!), to lose him in the third phase, giving him a penalty…

· The plan had worked: Olympiacos had found the first goal, and a fairly quick one at that, which would have given them the upper hand in the psychology of the derby. As previously in Tuba and won 4-1. As had preceded Olympiakos, so did PAOK in Karaiskakisin the regular season, and won 4-2.

· As for the arbitration, don’t get involved with PAOK, that they lost to him Portuguese. They don’t even make sense. This is where PAOK reduced in the 92′, they had indicated a six minute delay and whistled the end at 97+, with a foul in favor of PAOK. Referee who has come to give victory to Olympiakos, as he said… awesome Lucescu, doesn’t do that. Nor does he whistle a non-existent foul in favor of PAOK in the 8th minute, when Navarro and Tsikinio stole the ball from Koulierakis and while three attackers and one defender went on the counter-attack near Kotarski’s area…

· The Portuguese is an inexperienced referee and he made mistakes in the disciplinary control, but almost all at the expense of Olympiakos! For example in the 40’s Pontense he never committed a foul, in the 42′ o Navarro he also never committed a foul, at 45+1 he gave Zifkovic a card for a foul on Podense and at 86′ there was a foul for him Carvalho which was also not given. After all, the number of fouls, 17 against Olympiakos and only 6 against PAOK, should tell us a lot. However, regardless of his mistakes, the Portuguese was clear that he did not come to play for one team or the other.

· Besides, the same way in which he whistled was shown in every detail: for example, how he gave a penalty against Koulierakis for pushing Navarro, so a little later he gave him a foul PAOK (and card to Abby) for pushing at Murg… Under these circumstances, I can express my regret for the way in which he behaved Andria Zifkovic to the referee and well because he was the captain, but also for his provocative image Zifko Zifkovic protesting from the bench.

· And one last thing: the home factor played a big role in the dominance of Olympiakos yesterday. The crowd helped the team a lot and he became their 12th player. Karaiskaki was a really good headquarters from 29,000 Olympianswho understood that after the triumph in Europe the team needed as much and as good support as possible.

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