Four for four, and the squad that was built to do it
Panathinaikos 2–0 Panetolikos at the OAKA on Sunday, and that is 9 points from 3 league games, top of the table on +6 (6). Three wins in a row now, and none of them tight: Levadiakos 0–2 away on August 31, PAOK 3–1 at home on September 6, Kifisia 3–1 at home on September 10.
The team is not scraping results. It is winning the middle hour of games and then managing them. That is what a title squad looks like in September.
Salah-Eddine arrives, and the market work looks finished
The last piece landed. Panathinaikos confirmed Salah-Eddine on loan with a purchase option, announced on the day of the Panetolikos match (5). From Italy, the terms are a €7m buy clause plus €1m in bonuses (7).
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That is the profile Nikos Athanasiou put to bwinSPOR FM 94.6 as the final addition of the window (5). A loan with an option that size tells you the club is not filling a gap, it is auditioning a starter. The window is closed and the squad is what it is.
The Antino question, answered by the system
Antino has started the season better than he finished the last one, and the explanation is tactical rather than motivational (4). More space to attack one against one instead of chasing long balls into channels, and the player looks like a different man (4).
That is Jakob Nistruup's stamp on the team, and it is the clearest tactical trend of this young season. The results back it up. Panathinaikos have scored three in two separate home games.
What to watch
Kalamata away on September 20 is the next league test, and it is a different assignment from the last three: no OAKA crowd, a smaller pitch, a team that will sit deep (fixtures). The Antino one-against-one formula gets harder when there is no space to run into. That is the game to judge whether this team can win ugly.
Before that, watch whether Salah-Eddine gets minutes, because a loan with a €7m option is not a squad filler (5)(7). Nine points from three is a start, not a verdict.
