Conference League defeats for Olympiakos and PAOK
Olympiakos and PAOK, Greece’s representatives in the Europa Conference League, have a mountain to climb if they are to qualify from their round-of-16 ties, following their defeats in Thursday’s first-leg games.
Olympiakos suffered its first loss under manager Jose Luis Mendilibar, but it was quite a loss: The Reds went down 4-1 at home to a ruthless Maccabi Tel Aviv and are all but out of the competition.
Less than two years after losing 4-0 at home to Maccabi Haifa, the Reds showed a similar defensive frailty and conceded twice in the first 10 minutes to Maccabi Tel Aviv’s Eran Zahavi and Ido Shahar.
Ayoub El Kaabi pulled a goal back for the Reds, but before half-time Zahavi struck again and in the second half Dor Peretz stretched further the Israeli team’s advantage ahead of next week’s second leg, that will take place in Serbia.
PAOK was also betrayed by its poor defending, going down 2-0 to Dinamo Zagreb in Croatia.
The heroics of local boy and PAOK keeper Dominik Kotarski were not enough to keep all Dinamo efforts away on the night at Stadion Maksimir.
The Zagreb team’s captain Bruno Petkovic scored once in every half to give the Croats a clear advantage ahead of next Thursday’s return at Toumba.
