In a game that will be remembered rather for the hard shadowing and the duels among the players than for the moments of playing at football, Panathinaikos drew 0-0 against Larissa in “AEL FC Arena”, for the last match of 2016 and the 15th match day of the Super League’s championship.

Actually the match never kept a rhythm and during the whole first period there was no chance at all that could really threat the two goalkeepers, who didn’t need to intervene. Hard duels prevailed; many fouls and errors were committed by both teams.

As a matter of fact neither the performance nor the quality of the game improved, even not during the second half. There were just some chances that raised the rate of interest of the match. The home team started the match in a more dynamic way and was able to conclude some chances mainly till the 65th minute, though without any goal.

Panathinaikos continued to have problems in creating chances as it couldn’t find a way to reach the box of its opponents. This particular detail slightly changed in the last part of the game, after the entrance of Panayiotis Vlachodimos and Sebastian Leto on the pitch. Both players were able to find some space and after collaborating with Berg, Panathinaikos was able to threaten for the first time.

The match was rather approaching to its end when things became even more difficult as Zeca was expelled by a direct red card in the 81st minute for a hit in cold blood, leaving the team with ten. Nevertheless, Panathinaikos lost its best chance in the 92nd minute, playing with one player less, when Leto, after receiving a ball by Vlachodimos, shot from the penalty area but Xenodohov saved his posts by redirecting it into a corner. Finally, the score 0-0 remained leaving the “Greens” even further in the race of the championship.

The teams:

AEL: Xenodohov, Rentzas, Golias (87’ Lambropoulos), Farkas, Moniakis, Anastassopoulos (83’ Potouridis), Fation, Dodo, Kapos (74’ Yiovanovic), Nazlidis, Deletic.

Panathinaikos: Vlachodimos Ο., Coulibaly, Koutroumbis, Moledo, Hult, Zeca, Marinakis, Villafañes (84’ Mesto), Boumal (58’Vlachodimos P.), MPoku (65’ Leto), Berg.