With an… improbable buzzer beater by Nikos Karelis in the 94th minute, Panaitolikos left “Th. Vardinogiannis”, defeating OFI 2-1 in the first quarter-final of the Greek Cup.
Panaitolikos had a much more convincing image and took the lead before the twenty-minute mark with Joao Pedro, but the Cretans reacted, equalizing with Bakits in the 47th minute, before Karelis “spoke”.
Panaitolikos found a goal in his first really good chance of the match. In the 19th minute, Fred Duarte raced several meters from the right and “broke” the ball at the right moment to João Pedro, who made no mistake making it 1-0 for the Agrinio team.
In the 34th minute, the visitors had another great moment, when Mavrias passed to Duarte, he made the cut, with the ball reaching Pedro, but Sotiriou had a very good reaction in front of the Panaitolikos striker.
OFI entered much stronger at the start of the second half, tying the match. Mosquera from the left passed to Thorarinsson, who made a nice turn and Bakic with a diagonal shot at the front post made it 1-1 in the 47th minute.
In the 61st minute, Sotiriou made a big mistake, marking Joao Pedro, but the latter, instead of executing with composure, made a bad finish by placing too far out, while in the very next minute, Fred Duarte had another good chance, but the shot he attempted he passed out a bit.
Panaitolikos continued to be a threat and in the 74th minute he had a good free kick by Sengelias that went just wide of the left post of Sotiriou, while a minute later (75′) Bakakis’ shot went just wide.
The visitors not only withstood the relative pressure exerted by OFI in the last ten minutes, but also found the winning goal with Karelis in the 4th minute of stoppage time. Duarte took the ball and “carried” it again for half the court, before passing it to the left to Karelis. The experienced striker of Panaitolikos “emptied” his personal opponent and with a wonderful place made it 2-1 for Agriniotes, giving them a very strong lead for the qualification to the “4”.
The compositions of the two teams:
OFI (Pepe Mel): Sotiriou, Vouros (59′ ltr. Larson), Lambropoulos, Bresan, Thorarinson, Meyado (46′ Glazer), Gayegos, Apostolakis (46′ Toral), Mosquera (72′ Baku), Bakics, Diko (46′ Luiz Felipe ).
PANAITOLIKOS (Yiannis Petrakis): Stergiakis, Liavas, Malis, Stagits, Mavrias, Fr. Duarte, Tsingaras (69′ Bakakis), Bouzoukis (42′ Peres), Hatzitheodoridis (69′ Torrejon), Dias (69′ Sengelia), Joao Pedro (77′ Karelis).
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