Historic come from behind victory for AEK
For the first time in club history, AEK came from two goals down to defeat their rivals, Olympiacos. As for Olympiacos, the last time the Erythrolefki gave up a 2-goal lead and tasted defeat was back in 1996 in domestic league play and 1999 when factoring in European play.
AEK pulled of a historic comeback in Sunday’s derby against Olympiacos, turning a two goal deficit around in the final 30 minutes to record a 3-2 victory. In addition, it was AEK’s first ever comeback victory over Olympiacos at the OAKA stadium in a total of 33 matches played between the two sides. As a result, the Kitrinomavri now sit atop the Superleague standings, 5 points ahead of Olympiacos for the first time in 9 years.
As the home team, AEK count only two comeback victories against the team from Piraeus. The first comeback victory was way back in 1961 when the Kitrinomavri fell behind after Psichos’ 33rd minute goal in their A’ Ethniki fixture. However, a dominating second half display from the Enosis where they scored 4 goals (Papapostolou, Stamatiadis, and Nestoridis-2), gave AEK the 4-1 win.
AEK’s second comeback victory at home over Olympiacos came in 1984 when two goals from Thomas Mavros (78’, 87’) earned the Enosis a 2-1 victory despite falling behind in the 64th minute to Anastopoulos’ goal.
AEK’s most recent comeback against Olympiacos was in 2010 at the Karaiskakis stadium. Then, Nacho Scocco scored twice (33’, 40’) to give the Enosis a 1-2 away victory, after Papadopoulos opened the scoring in the 26th minute.
As for Olympiacos, the club has only lost two games in the last 21 years after taking a two-goal advantage, one in the Superleague and one in the Champions League.
We have to travel back to May 1996 when Olympiacos last lost a Greek Superleague (then A’ Ethniki) game after taking a two goal lead. The Erythrolefki, under coach Takis Persias, traveled to the Alkazar stadium to face Larissa where they went ahead 0-2 with goals from Sapanis (7’) and Karapialis (32’). However, the team from Thessalia pulled level with Milos (45’) and Kolomitrousis (72’) before Tsakmakidis’ stoppage time winner gave AEL the dramatic 3-2 victory. .
It was a similar situation three years later in the UEFA Champions League in an away fixture with Molde in Norway. Despite Olympiacos going ahead 0-2 with goals from Mavrogenidis (36’) and Zahovic (40’), Molde chalked up a second half comeback with two goals from Andreas Lund (54’, 59’) and one from Hestad (72’) to defeat the Greek champions.
