Mandy, Massoura, Tessiner nominations and management for the three crucial weeks

Pedro Martins was pleased with the performance of the Olympiacos players in the mid-week game against Panetolikos (3-1 win), so he won the away game against Ionikos (Sunday 6/2, 17:15, COSMOTE SPORT 2 HD and LIVE from Sportish).

The Portuguese coach is expected to lay down his cards in the afternoon in the last training session, which will take place in Renti, as the players had a break the day before yesterday (3/2) and the regulars recovered yesterday (4/2). In fact, some are not ruling out the red and white coach fielding the same team if Lala is confirmed to have recovered from the sprained right ankle.

On the other hand, there are those who believe that the Ivira coach should continue with a slight rotation, in the sense that after the match with Ionikos for Olympiakos follows the cup revenge with Panetolikos in Karaiskakis. The Piraeus side lost 2-1 in the first game in Agrinio, but in his statements immediately afterwards Martins left open the possibility of using several substitutes as well as players from the Olympiacos second team in the second leg.

For Portugal, the championship is the first goal, Europe is the second and the cup is the third. So he’s aiming for the best possible line-up in the game against Ionikos and isn’t currently thinking about taking revenge against Panetolikos in the cup. He will deal with this from Monday (February 7th) and take into account further data for the training of the eleven.

Martin’s thoughts on Ionian

Regarding the game against Ionikos, Mandi Kamara secures a place in the starting XI after serving his penalty in last Wednesday’s match against Agrinio’s side (2/2). It’s not out of the question that Martins might want to breathe a sigh of relief at Bouhalakis or that the two players should share their time at the Napoli Stadium.

Moreover, Masouras played as a substitute with Panetolikos in the last half hour of the game and he is also a candidate for the starting XI. The same applies to Ticino. The choice of the Portuguese coach to play with the team of Agrinio El Arabi and Ticinio at the beginning of the game and replace them with an hour with Ticinio and Masoura was not accidental. As for Lala, if Martins sees that he’s not quite ready or wants to protect him, then Androutsos will play.

Olympiacos now enter a difficult three-week period with commitments in three competitions, with a total of seven games that will decide much.

In turn, the red-whites meet Ionikos in Naples (6/2), Panaitolikos in the second half of the cup (9/2), AEK in the championship in Karaiskakis (13/2), for which they will travel to Bergamo for the game Atalanta (17/2), goes to Magnesia for the match with Volos in the championship (20/2) and then hosts Atalanta (24/2) and OFI (27/2) in Neos Faliros.

Therefore, it goes without saying that Martins will need proper management of potential while also providing proper competitive and mental preparation of players to effectively handle the busy schedule. Because the exact period will be judged if Olympiacos will maintain their difference with their rivals in the championship standings and their qualification for the 16 of the Europa League and for the semi-finals of the Greek Cup. We have therefore entered a very important month for Olympiakos.