Derby turns green, while PAOK remains on top
PAOK left it late at Peristeri but beat Atromitos, while the biggest win of this round in the Super League belonged to Panathinaikos that downed Olympiakos in the Derby of Eternal Rivals on Sunday.
The Greens, just a few days after eliminating the Reds in the Cup, defeated Olympiakos 2-0 at the Apostolos Nikolaidis Stadium in Turkish manager Fatih Terim’s first derby win in Greece.
Bernard gave the Greens a first-half lead and Alexander Jeremejeff added the second on the hour mark, for a result that leaves the Reds nine points off the pace.
PAOK struggled to beat the Atromitos defense on Sunday, but eventually won 2-0 thanks to late goals by Stefan Schwab and Yiannis Konstantelias, the latter scoring with a delightful chip in time added-on.
AEK had no problems against Asteras Tripolis at home, winning 4-2 after going 3-1 up at half-time.
Ezequiel Ponce scored a brace for AEK, Ervin Zukanovic made it 3-0 with an own goal, Julian Bartolo pulled one back for Asteras, Levi Garcia scored AEK’s fourth and Juan Miritello made the visitors’ second goal.
Fifth-placed Aris shared a 1-1 draw with Panserraikos at Serres. The league’s top scorer Loren Moron put Aris in front, but Kosta Aleksic equalized for Panserraikos deep into injury time.
PAOK is now on 50 points, AEK has 48, Panathinaikos 47, Olympiakos 41 and Aris 34. There are five games left for the end of the regular season, before the playoffs and the playouts, with PAOK hosting AEK next weekend.
In other weekend games, Lamia triumphed 4-1 at PAS Giannina to move up to sixth and within four points of Aris, Kifissia came off the bottom with a 2-1 victory at OFI Crete, and Volos drew 1-1 with Panetolikos.
