Go Ahead Eagles experienced a nice scoop on Thursday evening: in Greece the team won the first European victory in club history. The Deventenaren won the game against Panathinaikos in Athens with 1-2. In the final phase of the game (minute 75 and 82), striker Milan Smit with two hits with two Treffers made a person in person for the first official victory Go Ahead outside the Netherlands.
Go Ahead Eagles, playing in the very scanty stadium in the yellow-red home kit, lost last week in Deventer to the Romanian FCSB. On Thursday evening the Deventenaren received a resit with a, at least, at least, more difficult task. As expected, Panathinaikos also had the ball. It created easily opportunities and Go Ahead came very sparingly under Greek pressure.
Panathinaikos took a 1-0 lead ten minutes after the break. In the last part, the competition image changed and Go Ahead Eagles regained control. And not only that: thanks to two goals from Smit, the Greeks gave their lead completely away. In Greece it had rained all day, so it was uncertain in advance whether the game could continue.
Important victory for the Netherlands
The victory will have been received with great joy at Vetkampstraat in Deventer. But also for football fans outside of Deventer it is a welcome boost: no Dutch team has so far won a European game in the main tournament.
Only PSV took a point at Bayer Leverkusen (1-1) on Wednesday evening, while Ajax experienced a hopeless evening in Marseille on Tuesday (4-0 loss). On Thursday, FC Utrecht also lost 1-0 against the Norwegian Brann. AZ (from Aek Lacarna) and Feyenoord (at home against Aston Villa) will still take action on Thursday evening. All Dutch teams lost last week.
The European results determine how many teams the Eredivisie can delegate in the European tournaments. The better PSV, Ajax, Feyenoord, FC Utrecht, Go Ahead Eagles and AZ perform, the more coefficient points and therefore European playing teams on behalf of the Netherlands. The victory of Go Ahead was therefore very welcome, certainly because competitors in the ranking, Belgium and Portugal, performed better so far.
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