Petrakis: “I’m not crying, I got a little emotional. Congratulations to the children for their dedication and attitude.”

Panaitolikos had two goals to their name in the first quarter of the game against AEK, but did not disappoint and went for a positive result to secure a young 2-2 draw against the Greek doubles and grab an important point in the fight the evening before.

In fact, the performance was such that it thrilled and touched Yannis Petrakis. The experienced coach praised his footballers for their commitment and mentality, spoke of a team that functions like a family and urged everyone to give their all in the decisive game that follows with PAS Ioannina.

In detail, he told Cosmote TV:

“I’m not crying, I got a little emotional. These are moments in our work and emotions need to be expressed. First of all, I would like to praise the boys for their great performance, for the mentality we had as a team.

When you’re two goals behind in the 10th minute against a team like AEK, our task is not easy at all. But I have to say again: “Well done”, because both our image and our mentality were such at times that we succeeded and changed the situation, which shows that we can do even more important things.

Today’s game was a great success for us. We need to maintain this profile that we have as a team and strengthen it every day so that we can strive for more things through improvements in the future. And when I say improvement, not only in the tactical part but also in the mentality, with in mind to achieve general development as a team.

We have really great people, we’re in a really great organization. I want this to continue. The game is over, we have a very important game against PAS Ioannina, both for us and for them, we have to keep and strengthen what we had today.

At the end of the game we all gathered on the field because we want to be a family, we all win together and we all lose together. I, as a leader, will also say a word to reward what we have done.”