To ΑΕΚ LIVE επιστρέφει στην αρθρογραφία του στα Αγγλικά για τους φίλους της ΑΕΚ που έχουν μεγαλώσει και ζουν στο εξωτερικό… Η σκυτάλη στον Γιώργο Αγγελίδη, στη Νέα Υόρκη…

The time has finally come for the start of the season after a bit of a delay typical of Greek soccer nowadays. We start the season at home vs. Xanthi on Saturday at OAKA, a must win to get the season started on the right path with those 3 points in the bag.

By George Angelidis

AEK has had an a positive offseason I would say with many bright points. The brightest part has to be our big return to Europe where we unfortunately got knocked out in the 3rd qualifying round to Saint-Etienne 1-0 on aggregate after playing a nice 0-0 in France giving us a fighters chance in Greece where we came up just a bit short. This brief trip to European football was a huge statement for AEK in my eyes. Coming back from the 3rd division in just 3 years and qualifying for the Europa league says something about how massive this team is, this is where we belong. We got a taste test of things to come in the future.

Many new players came into the club in efforts to make is a much deeper one filled with more new talent. We sorted out our center back situation for sure signing two solid experienced center backs. We signed Joleon Lescott a veteran center back who has played a numerous amounts of years in England, arguably one of the most difficult leagues in the world. Playing alongside him is going to be Dmytro Chygrynskiy who we picked up from Dnipro. The 29 year old Ukrainian even made 12 appearances for Barcelona from 2009-2010. He was also a big name player for the Ukrainian national team a couple of years prior as well.

Then comes big Hugo Almedia the ex Portuguese international who’s a big physical number 9. The only knock about Hugo is that he came in a little overweight and out of shape. That shouldn’t be a problem now however as he had a solid preseason scoring some goals and getting his confidence up. I think that he has the potential if he stays fit and healthy to become a solid center forward in the Greek league. Towards the end of the transfer window we also signed Lazaro Christodoulopulos after he spent three years in Italy where he really couldn’t break out and make a name for himself. Nonetheless he can help out the team I think especially after the departure of Helder Barbosa and Diego Buonanotte.

Vasilis Barkas, Kostas Manolas 2.0, Juan Diaz, Papito Rodriguez, and last but not least Anastasios Bakasetas were all welcomed to the club as well. I personally like Bakaseta’s potential. At age 23 he showed some very positive things last year at Panionio hence why AEK was so interested in signing the young Greek international. I think that if he continues to develop his game he can become a very very good player for the team with many goals under his name. All in all, we signed 9 new players hopefully they can all step up and preform well this year.

The key offensive player for us this year has to be Petro Mantalo. He’s our playmaker who can create game when we are struggling to create goalscoring chances. We saw last year when he was fit and playing well what kind of difference maker he can be. Aravidi will always be Aravidi he doesn’t change. The boy bleeds yellow, even though he isn’t the most technical of players he will always give 100% game in and game out. Anesti our new number 1 has to be big this year after taking over the starting spot late in the year over Baroja who has also departed the club. Ronald Vargas also needs to show quality again this year especially on set pieces. Im sure we remember his three derby winners last year. Lets hope theres more to come next year.

It’s time to start our season and time to start our cup defense run. We must start the season on the right foot. It’s time to show everybody what he got and prove ourselves. I love when people doubt AEK because when we prove them wrong it feels a whole lot better. I feel like we have a pretty strong team this year and we can do some very dangerous things. I’m looking forward to it, Forza AEKARA!