2009–10 Super League Greece

The 2009–10 Super League Greece was the 74th season of the highest football league of Greece and the fourth under the name Super League. The league consisted of 16 teams. Participants are the 13 best teams from the 2008–09 season and three teams that have been promoted from the Beta Ethniki. On 11 April 2010, Panathinaikos defeated Iraklis 2–0 to secure their 20th Greek title and their first one in six years.^[1]

Super League Greece

Season	2009–10
Champions	Panathinaikos 20th Greek title
Relegated	Levadiakos PAS Giannina Panthrakikos
Champions League	Panathinaikos PAOK
Europa League	AEK Athens Aris Olympiacos
Matches played	252
Goals scored	587 (2.33 per match)
Top goalscorer	Djibril Cissé (23 goals)
Biggest home win	Olympiacos 5–1 Levadiakos Ergotelis 4–0 Panthrakikos Panathinaikos 4–0 AEL Panathinaikos 4–0 PAS Giannina
Biggest away win	Asteras Tripolis 0–4 Iraklis
Highest scoring	Skoda Xanthi 4–3 Iraklis Ergotelis 4–3 Asteras Tripolis
Longest unbeaten run	PAOK (12 matches)
← 2008–09 2010–11 →

Changes from 2008–09

Promotion and relegation

Teams promoted from 2008–09 Beta Ethniki:

• Champions: Atromitos
• Runners-up: PAS Giannina
• 3rd placed team: Kavala

Teams relegated to 2009–10 Beta Ethniki:

• 14th placed team: OFI
• 15th placed team: Panserraikos
• 16th placed team: Thrasyvoulos

Other changes

Due to Greece having ascended in the UEFA league coefficient rankings,^[2] the 2009–10 champions will enter 2010–11 UEFA Champions League at the group stage instead of the third qualifying round. Every other European spot remains unchanged, meaning that the winner of the European play-off group will reach the third qualifying round of the Champions League while the runners-up and third-placed team of this group will enter 2010–11 UEFA Europa League.

Team overview

Stadia and locations

AEK Athens
Atromitos
Panathinaikos
Panionios

Aris
Iraklis
PAOK

Asteras

Ergotelis

Kavala

AEL

Levadiakos

Olympiacos

Panthrakikos

PAS Giannina

Skoda Xanthi

Location of the 2009–10 Super League Greece teams

Club	Location	Venue	Capacity
AEK Athens	Athens	Athens Olympic Stadium	71,030
AEL	Larissa	Alcazar Stadium	13,108
Aris	Thessaloniki	Kleanthis Vikelidis Stadium	22,800
Asteras Tripolis	Tripoli	Asteras Tripolis Stadium	6,430
Atromitos	Athens	Peristeri Stadium	8,939
Ergotelis	Heraklion	Pankritio Stadium	26,240
PAS Giannina	Ioannina	Zosimades Stadium	7,652
Iraklis	Thessaloniki	Kaftanzoglio Stadium	27,770
Kavala	Kavala	Anthi Karagianni Stadium	12,500
Levadiakos	Livadeia	Levadia Municipal Stadium	5,915
Olympiacos	Piraeus	Karaiskakis Stadium	33,334
Panathinaikos	Athens	Athens Olympic Stadium	71,030
Panionios	Athens	Nea Smyrni Stadium	11,700
Panthrakikos	Komotini	Komotini Municipal Stadium	6,500
PAOK	Thessaloniki	Toumba Stadium	28,701
Skoda Xanthi	Xanthi	Skoda Xanthi Arena	7,361

Personnel and kits

Team	Manager	Captain	Kit manufacturer	Shirt sponsor
AEK Athens	Dušan Bajević	Pantelis Kafes	Puma	Diners Club
AEL	Marinos Ouzounidis	Nikos Dabizas	Adidas	On Telecoms
Aris	Héctor Cúper	Sergio Koke	Reebok	EKO
Asteras Tripolis	Mario Gómez	Nikolaos Lazaridis	Lotto	OPAP
Atromitos	Giorgos Donis	Chrysostomos Michailidis	Asics	OPAP
Ergotelis	Nikos Karageorgiou	Silva Júnior	Lotto	OPAP
Iraklis	Jozef Bubenko	Anastasios Katsabis	Puma	Attica Bank
Kavala	Aad de Mos	Siniša Dobrašinović	Puma	OPAP
Levadiakos	Quique Hernández	Georgios Zisopoulos	Puma	OPAP
Olympiacos	Božidar Bandović	Antonios Nikopolidis	Puma	Citibank
Panathinaikos	Nikos Nioplias	Giorgos Karagounis	Adidas	Cosmote
Panionios	Akis Mantzios	Giannis Maniatis	Diadora	WIND
Panthrakikos	Pavlos Dermitzakis	Nikolaos Bacharidis	Umbro	OPAP
PAOK	Fernando Santos	Sérgio Conceição	Puma	DEPA
PAS Giannina	Nikos Anastopoulos	Georgios Dasios	Umbro	Zagori
Skoda Xanthi	Ioannis Matzourakis	Giannis Papadimitriou	Hummel	Emporiki Bank

Managerial changes

Team	Outgoing manager	Manner of departure	Date of vacancy	Replaced by	Date of appointment
Panthrakikos	Ilie Dumitrescu	Sacked	27 August 2009	Albert Cartier	27 August 2009
Olympiacos	Temuri Ketsbaia		14 September 2009[3]	Zico	16 September 2009[4]
Skoda Xanthi	Wolfgang Wolf	Mutual consent	15 September 2009	Ioannis Matzourakis	21 September 2009[5]
Levadiakos	Momčilo Vukotić		23 September 2009	Quique Hernández	30 September 2009[6]
Asteras Tripolis	Mario Gómez		25 October 2009[7]	Vangelis Vlachos	25 October 2009
Iraklis	Oleh Protasov		30 October 2009[8]	Savvas Kofidis	30 October 2009[9]
Aris	Mazinho		2 November 2009[10]	Héctor Cúper	6 November 2009[11]
Kavala	Giannis Papakostas		14 November 2009	Vangelis Goutis	15 November 2009
PAS Giannina	Georgios Paraschos		7 December 2009	Nikos Anastopoulos	13 January 2010
Panathinaikos	Henk ten Cate	Sacked	8 December 2009[12]	Nikos Nioplias	8 December 2009[13]
Panthrakikos	Albert Cartier	Mutual consent	11 January 2010	Pavlos Dermitzakis	12 January 2010
Iraklis	Savvas Kofidis	Sacked	24 January 2010[14]	Jozef Bubenko	25 January 2010[14]
Panionios	Emilio Ferrera	Mutual consent	25 January 2010[15]	Akis Mantzios	29 January 2010[16]
Olympiacos	Zico	Sacked	19 January 2010[17]	Božidar Bandović	19 January 2010[17]
Kavala	Vangelis Goutis	Mutual consent	25 January 2010	Aad De Mos	28 January 2010
Panionios	Akis Mantzios	Sacked	3 February 2010	Georgios Paraschos	3 February 2010
Skoda Xanthi	Ioannis Matzourakis		22 February 2010	Nikos Kehagias	23 February 2010
AEL	Marinos Ouzounidis	Mutual Consent	22 February 2010	Giannis Papakostas	22 February 2010

Regular season

League table

Pos	Team	Pld	W	D	L	GF	GA	GD	Pts	Qualification or relegation
1	Panathinaikos (C)	30	22	4	4	54	17	+37	70	Qualification for the Champions League group stage
2	Olympiacos	30	19	7	4	47	18	+29	64	Qualification for the Play-offs
3	PAOK	30	19	5	6	41	16	+25	62
4	AEK Athens	30	15	8	7	43	31	+12	53
5	Aris	30	12	10	8	35	28	+7	46
6	Kavala	30	10	9	11	31	32	−1	39
7	Atromitos	30	10	8	12	34	36	−2	38
8	AEL	30	10	7	13	31	42	−11	37[a]
9	Panionios	30	9	10	11	34	35	−1	37[a]
10	Iraklis	30	10	7	13	39	41	−2	37[a]
11	Ergotelis	30	9	9	12	37	41	−4	36[b]
12	Asteras Tripolis	30	10	6	14	29	36	−7	36[b]
13	Skoda Xanthi	30	10	5	15	27	36	−9	35
14	Levadiakos (R)	30	9	7	14	31	44	−13	34	Relegation to the Football League
15	PAS Giannina (R)	30	7	7	16	27	46	−19	28
16	Panthrakikos (R)	30	3	3	24	21	62	−41	12

Source: Super League Greece
Rules for classification: 1) Points; 2) Head-to-head points; 3) Head-to-head goal difference; 4) Play-offs (neutral ground).
(Note: Criterion 4 is only used if needed to decide champion, teams for relegation or teams for UEFA competitions).
(C) Champions; (R) Relegated
Notes:

1. Head-to-head points: Larissa 7, Panionios 5, Iraklis 4.
2. Head-to-head points: Ergotelis 6, Asteras Tripolis 0.

Results

Home \ Away	AEK	AEL	ARIS	AST	ATR	ERG	IRA	KAV	LEV	OLY	PAO	PGSS	PNT	PAOK	PAS	XAN
AEK Athens		3–1	1–0	2–0	3–3	1–0	1–0	3–0	3–2	1–2	0–1	1–1	3–2	1–0	3–1	3–1
AEL	1–0		2–2	1–0	2–2	1–0	2–1	1–0	1–2	0–2	0–3	2–2	0–2	2–1	0–0	2–0
Aris	1–1	2–0		0–1	1–0	2–1	4–2	0–0	1–0	1–0	0–0	1–1	0–2	2–0	1–0	1–0
Asteras Tripolis	2–0	0–0	2–1		1–2	2–4	0–4	1–0	2–1	1–3	0–1	2–0	3–1	1–1	3–0	0–0
Atromitos	0–1	2–1	0–3	0–0		0–0	2–1	2–0	3–0	0–1	0–3	1–0	3–1	0–0	2–1	1–0
Ergotelis	2–2	0–0	0–0	4–3	1–1		1–3	1–0	1–0	1–1	0–3	0–0	4–0	0–2	3–1	1–0
Iraklis	1–1	2–1	2–2	1–0	2–2	0–2		1–0	1–1	1–0	0–1	0–2	3–1	1–1	2–0	2–4
Kavala	2–1	3–3	1–1	0–1	2–1	1–3	1–0		2–2	0–0	2–2	1–1	3–0	0–0	1–0	2–1
Levadiakos	0–0	3–0	0–2	1–0	1–1	2–2	1–0	0–1		0–3	0–2	1–0	2–0	0–2	4–1	2–1
Olympiacos	1–2	2–1	2–1	3–0	2–0	2–1	1–1	0–0	5–1		2–0	1–0	3–0	0–1	2–2	0–0
Panathinaikos	1–1	4–0	2–1	1–1	3–1	4–1	2–0	0–2	3–0	0–1		2–1	2–0	2–1	4–0	1–0
Panionios	3–1	0–3	1–1	1–3	2–1	1–1	0–0	1–2	2–2	0–1	0–2		3–1	0–0	3–1	3–0
Panthrakikos	1–2	1–3	1–1	0–0	0–3	3–2	1–2	1–3	0–2	0–2	0–1	0–1		1–2	1–2	1–1
PAOK	0–1	1–0	4–1	1–0	1–0	4–1	1–0	1–0	3–0	1–2	2–1	1–0	3–0		2–0	1–0
PAS Giannina	1–1	2–0	0–1	1–0	1–0	1–0	2–3	2–1	1–1	2–2	0–1	2–3	2–0	0–1		0–0
Skoda Xanthi	1–0	0–1	2–1	2–0	2–1	1–0	4–3	2–1	1–0	0–1	1–2	1–2	1–0	0–3	1–1

Source: Super League Greece
Legend: Blue = home team win; Yellow = draw; Red = away team win.

Play-offs

In the play-off for Champions League, the teams play each other in a home and away round robin. However, they do not all start with 0 points. Instead, a weighting system applies to the teams' standing at the start of the play-off mini-league. The team finishing fifth in the Super League will start the play-off with 0 points. The fifth placed team's end of season tally of points is subtracted from the sum of the points that other teams have. This number is then divided by five to give the other teams the points with which they start the mini-league.

The teams started the play-offs with the following number of points:

• Olympiacos – 4 points ((64–46) / 5 = 3.6, rounded up to 4)
• PAOK – 3 points ((62–46) / 5 = 3.2, rounded to 3)
• AEK Athens – 1 point ((53–46) / 5 = 1.4, rounded to 1)
• Aris – 0 points ((46–46) / 5 = 0)

Pos	Team	Pld	W	D	L	GF	GA	GD	Pts	Qualification		PAOK	AEK	ARIS	OLY
2	PAOK	6	4	1	1	7	3	+4	16	Qualification for the Champions League third qualifying round			1–0	2–0	1–0
3	AEK Athens	6	2	2	2	8	7	+1	9	Qualification for the Europa League play-off round[a]		0–0		4–2	2–1
4	Aris	6	2	2	2	8	9	−1	8[b]	Qualification for the Europa League third qualifying round[a]		3–2	1–1		2–0
5	Olympiacos	6	1	1	4	3	7	−4	8[b]	Qualification for the Europa League second qualifying round[a]		0–1	2–1	0–0

Source: Superleague Greece: Standings and Schedule
Rules for classification: 1) points; 2) head-to-head points; 3) head-to-head goal difference; 4) head-to-head goals scored; 5) goal difference; 6) number of goals scored.
Notes:

1. Since Aris lost the 2009–10 Greek Football Cup Final against Champions League-qualified Panathinaikos, all Europa League spots will be determined by the play-off group positions.
2. Head-to-head record: Aris–Olympiacos 2–0, Olympiacos–Aris 0–0.

Top scorers

Source: Galanis Sports Data

Rank	Player	Club	Goals
1	Djibril Cissé	Panathinaikos	23
2	Giorgos Barkoglou	Levadiakos	11
	Victoraș Iacob	Iraklis
	Javier Cámpora	Aris
5	Benjamin Onwuachi	Kavala	10
	Danijel Cesarec	Asteras Tripolis
7	Kostas Mitroglou	Olympiacos	9
8	Ilias Anastasakos	Atromitos	8
	Emanuel Perrone	Atromitos
	Boško Balaban	Panionios
	Ismael Blanco	AEK Athens
	Ignacio Scocco	AEK Athens
	Kostas Katsouranis	Panathinaikos

Awards

MVP and Best Goal Awards

Matchday	MVP	Best Goal	Ref
1st	Vasilis Torosidis (Olympiacos)		[18]
2nd	Krisztián Németh (AEK Athens)	Enzo Maresca (Olympiacos)	[19]
3rd	Sebastián Leto (Panathinaikos)	Georgios Fotakis (PAOK)	[20]
4th	Vasilis Torosidis (Olympiacos)	Vieirinha (PAOK)	[21]
5th	Wilson Oruma (Kavala)	Sebastián Abreu (Aris)	[22]
6th	Dimitrios Eleftheropoulos (PAS Giannina)	Kostas Katsouranis (Panathinaikos)	[23]
7th	Ignacio Scocco (AEK Athens)	Benjamin Onwuachi (Kavala)	[24]
8th	Kostas Katsouranis (Panathinaikos)		[25]
9th	Djibril Cissé (Panathinaikos)	Stefanos Siontis (Kavala)	[26]
10th	Apostolos Vellios (Iraklis)	Boško Balaban (Panionios)	[27]
11th	Apostolos Giannou (Kavala)	Bertrand Robert (Panthrakikos)	[28]
12th	Ignacio Scocco (AEK Athens)	Luiz Brito (Atromitos)	[29]
13th	Toni Calvo (Aris)	Kostas Katsouranis (Panathinaikos)	[30]
14th	Sotiris Ninis (Panathinaikos)	Lucas Favalli (Atromitos)	[31]
15th	Giannis Taralidis (Levadiakos)	Djibril Cissé (Panathinaikos)	[32]
16th	Ignacio Scocco (AEK Athens)	Stelios Iliadis (Iraklis)	[33]
17th	Emanuel Perrone (Atromitos)	Toni Calvo (Aris)	[34]
18th	Michalis Sifakis (Aris)	Giorgos Karagounis (Panathinaikos)	[35]
19th	Vladan Ivić (PAOK)	Dimitrios Giantsis (Iraklis)	[36]
20th	Mirnes Šišić (PAS Giannina)	Ignacio Scocco (AEK Athens)	[37]
21st	Ismael Blanco (AEK Athens)	Djibril Cissé (Panathinaikos)	[38]
22nd	Diogo Rincón (Kavala)	Ignacio Scocco (AEK Athens)	[39]
23rd	Benjamin Onwuachi (Kavala)	Pablo García (PAOK)	[40]
24th	Vieirinha (PAOK)	Mehdi Nafti (Aris)	[41]
25th	Georgios Tzavellas (Panionios)	Serge Dié (Iraklis)	[42]
26th	Javier Cámpora (Aris)	Giorgos Karagounis (Panathinaikos)	[43]
27th	Grigoris Papazacharias (Iraklis)	Dimitrios Souanis (Skoda Xanthi)	[44]
28th	Sotiris Ninis (Panathinaikos)	Ignacio Scocco (AEK Athens)	[45]
29th	Loukas Vyntra (Panathinaikos)	Sotiris Ninis (Panathinaikos)	[46]
30th	Zlatan Muslimović (PAOK)	Giannis Karalis (Atromitos)	[47]

Annual awards

Annual awards were announced on 20 December 2010.^[48]

Award	Winner	Club
Greek Player of the Season	Vasilis Torosidis	Olympiacos
Foreign Player of the Season	Djibril Cissé	Panathinaikos
Young Player of the Season	Sotiris Ninis	Panathinaikos
Goalkeeper of the Season	Michalis Sifakis	Aris
Golden Boot	Djibril Cissé	Panathinaikos
Manager of the Season	Fernando Santos	PAOK