Marked for Lilian Deville
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Boardroom8 Mar 2027
The end came on a Tuesday, as these things usually do: a short meeting, a shorter statement, and Anastasios Androutsos clearing his office by noon. Football’s cruellest ritual, performed to schedule.
Match8 Mar 2027
Panetolikos are in real trouble now
Position 12, 29 points, and a fixture list with fewer games left in it than excuses. The arithmetic is not cruel yet, but it has stopped being kind.
Market8 Mar 2027
“I have given everything here and I need a new challenge.” The request is formal, and the relationship will never be quite the same again.
Boardroom8 Mar 2027
“Somebody has to pick the team on Saturday, and this week that is me.” An interim appointment with no promises attached, which is how most of them start.
Squad8 Mar 2027
“I never wanted to be anywhere else. There is unfinished business here.” Unai Garcia commits to Panetolikos for another 2 years.
Squad8 Mar 2027
“Some mornings you wake up and you are still a long way from everything you know.” It is not the football and it never was; Panetolikos are dealing with a man who wants a different country.
Back issues
From our football correspondent
Upbeat
Player ratings15 Feb 2027
Two goals and a mark of 8.51 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
Player ratings15 Feb 2027
Successful dribbles: 27. Every time he got the ball somebody had to make a decision, and every time the decision was wrong.
Match13 Feb 2027
4 wins on the spin now, and the question has changed from whether the run ends to who ends it. Confidence like this cannot be bought; it has to be earned exactly this way.
Squad15 Feb 2027
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Panetolikos this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad15 Feb 2027
Lenny Lobato falls out with a teammate over standards
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
Match13 Feb 2027
A 2‑1 win over Panserraikos, earned rather than given, and the sort of afternoon that sends everyone home talking about next week instead of this one.
Squad15 Feb 2027
“If you cannot run for the shirt, somebody else will wear it.” No name was used and none was needed; every player in that room knew who it was for.
Squad15 Feb 2027
The team sheet said everything about Sebastian Mladen
Warm-up bib, ninety minutes of watching, and a handshake at the end that fooled nobody. Big matches tell you who a manager trusts; this one told Sebastian Mladen.
Market15 Feb 2027
“We are a long way apart, and pretending otherwise helps nobody.” Neither side is close, and the calendar is not on the club's side.
From our football correspondent
Crisis
Match16 Jan 2027
12 matches without a win for Panetolikos
The run now stands at 12, and the questions being asked around Panetolikos are no longer polite ones.
Match16 Jan 2027
A 2-goal lead gone for Panetolikos
It is a specific kind of quiet, a ground watching a winning position dissolve. OFI kept coming because nothing stopped them, and Panetolikos will be asked about the last half hour all week.
Market18 Jan 2027
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Panetolikos can pretend not to have heard.
Player ratings18 Jan 2027
Two goals and a mark of 8.24 to go with them. Strikers are judged on afternoons like this one and remembered for far fewer of them than people imagine.
Market18 Jan 2027
The chase for Darnell Bile ended with $310.0K changing hands and Panserraikos out of reasons to say no. The supporters will judge the fee the only way that matters: on Saturdays.
Market18 Jan 2027
Volos NPS paid $390.0K and Panetolikos took it, which is the whole story in one sentence. The longer version involves a wage budget and will be told all season.
Match16 Jan 2027
Beaten 2‑3, and beaten fairly. The manager kept his words short afterwards, which was probably wise.
Squad18 Jan 2027
Words at Panetolikos training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Alexandru Măţan is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
Squad18 Jan 2027
“I have given this everything, but my family is not here and neither am I, not really.” A footballer can be coached out of bad form. Nobody has ever been coached out of this, and Panetolikos know it.
From our football correspondent
Crisis
The terraces4 Jan 2027
The mood at Panetolikos has turned into something else
Supporters who sing when it goes badly are supporters. Supporters who gather afterwards are a problem, and everybody inside the building knows which of the two this now is.
Match2 Jan 2027
10 matches without a win for Panetolikos
The run now stands at 10, and the questions being asked around Panetolikos are no longer polite ones.
Squad4 Jan 2027
Some afternoons a goalkeeper is the team. 9 saves, several of them the sort nobody expects to see stopped, and a scoreline that flatters everybody in front of him.
Boardroom4 Jan 2027
The scrutiny sharpens at Panetolikos
Nobody upstairs has said anything, which is the loudest thing they could do. Results buy silence in this game; the account at Panetolikos is running low.
Squad4 Jan 2027
An individual honour is a strange thing in a team game, and the best of them are never argued with. He has had the sort of year that ends with his name being read out, and Panetolikos have had the benefit of it.
Market4 Jan 2027
“This is not anger. I have thought about it for months, and nothing that has happened lately changed my mind.” The request is on a desk at Panetolikos, and it is not being withdrawn.
Market4 Jan 2027
The interest is real enough to have reached print. Panetolikos have said nothing, which in a transfer window is its own kind of answer.
Squad4 Jan 2027
55 days, the medical staff say, and medical staff are optimists by profession. The team sheet will look wrong without him.
Squad4 Jan 2027
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Panetolikos this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.