The sale of Konstantinos Koulierakis by PAOK in the German Wolfsburg, in addition to the prestige of the “double-header” in the European market, it also boosted the club’s profits from the sales of its players, as it became the most expensive sale (it reached 15 million euros) and surpassed that of Christos Joli in summer 2021 in Norwich which had reached €13m.
Ivan Savvidis’ team is clearly following in the footsteps of Olympiakos, which in the era of both Sokratis Kokkalis and Vangelis Marinakis (especially this one) sold and sells very expensively. Yes, Vang. Marinakis has taken it to another level by entering the world of the largest transfer agencies in Europe and can thus determine to a significant extent the give and take of Olympiakos in the international transfer market.
Be that as it may, the owners of Olympiakos and PAOK appear to be far outside the narrow Greek transfer limits and this is largely due to the fact that both invest many millions in their teams’ academies, culminating in the acquisition of Youth League from Piraeus last season (Olympiakos U19 was competing last night in the final of the Intercontinental Cup in the famous Maracana of Rio de Janeiro in Brazil against the corresponding champion of South America Flamengo).
Sales-gold
On the occasion of the sale of Koulierakis, Documento searched for the 15 most expensive sales of Olympiakos and PAOK footballers. The “red and white” of course have the lion’s share as only from these 15 transfers they put in their coffers the astronomical amount of 176,150,000 euros in Greek terms! It should be noted here that out of the 15 sales, three were made during Sokr. Bone with 30 million profit: Neri Castillo in 2007 to Shakhtar Donetsk for 15 million euros, the troubled Slovenian Zlatko Zahovic to Valencia in 2000 for 8 million euros and Grigoris Georgatos to Inter for 7 million euros in 1999. All they were a record for their era for a Greek club.
The rest of the “red and white” sales were made by Vagg. Marinakis and brought more than 146 million euros to Olympiakos’ coffers, while the six most expensive sales from a Greek club belong to the “red and whites”! The most expensive of all was that of Daniel Pontense at Wolves which reached 20 million in the summer of 2019. A sale that surpassed that of Panagiotis Retsos at Leverkusen instead of 17.5 million euros. They are followed by the sale of Mitroglou in 2013 to Fulham, of Milivojevic to Crystal Palace in 2016 and of Kostas Manolas in 2014 to Roma, with amounts just over 15 million.
Ivan’s sales
During the Ivan Savvidis era, PAOK not only stabilized for good in a leading role in Greek football at all levels, not only got rid of unbearable debts, not only did it win championships and cups, but also the powerful team it has built over the years Lucescu, moved to a higher level and in everything that has to do with the sale of players, many of whom were natives of his academies, shot up their market value and left for other states, while also filling the coffers of the “two-headed ». During the years of Savvidis (from 2012), PAOK made the most expensive sales in its history.
The sale record was held until last week by one of his own children, Christos Tzolis who was sold in 2021 for €11m to Norwich (there was also a target bonus of another €2m but it was not achieved). This record has now been broken by Konstantinos Koulierakis. The international Greek central defender (and keen scorer) was sold to German Wolfsburg, Adelino Vieirania’s former team, for 14.7 million euros. Third on the sale list is Aleksandar Prijovic, who went to Al Ittihad in Saudi Arabia for €10m. Next is Dimitris Giannoulis, who also went (initially on loan) to Norwich for 8 million euros, while over 5 million Douglas Augusto was sold to Nantes last summer and Karel Swinderski in 2022 to Charlotte of the American MLS.
It is noteworthy, finally, that the “two-headed” has sold or loaned to foreign teams during the Savvidis era several of the children of his academies or Greek children he has brought up, such as Giannoulis, Koulouris, Tzolis, Tzimas, Limnios , Koulierakis and of course has in the pipeline the 21-year-old international midfielder Giannis Constantelias, already champion and cup winner of Greece, who is being targeted by dozens of major European clubs.
What are AEK, PAO doing?
Against Olympiakos and PAOK, the other two giants of Greek football seem to have fallen far behind and it seems as if the European market in terms of selling their players seems like something far away. And if something is still moving in the Union, even if in shallow waters, Panathinaikos, once the country’s ambassador in football Europe, in the last 15 years has been lost from the European market in terms of sales.
This summer, AEK sold Eki Ponce to Houston Dynamo in the MLS for 8.6 million euros, which automatically became the most expensive sale of the “double-header”. The previous one was of Vassilis Barkas in 2020 to Celtic instead of 5 million euros. It is characteristic that the immediately previous most expensive transfer took place 16 years ago, in August 2008, when he transferred Sokratis Papastathopoulos to Genoa for 3.8 million euros. In fourth place we find the sale of the troubled Ognien Vranies to Anderlecht for €3.2 million and the top five is rounded off by a surprise player, Marios Mitai, who was sold to Lokomotiv Moscow for €3.1 million. In total, the “two-headed” since 1996 when he gave Vasilis Ciarta to Sevilla and to date has put in his coffers 40.9 million euros from the sale of ten football players.
For Panathinaikos, things are not rosy at this level. One only has to look at the list of the ten most expensive sales to be depressed, even from a club that was a pioneer in bringing out stars from its academies. The last sale of the “greens” that entered the top ten most expensive was Odysseus Vlachodimos in 2018 and the one immediately preceding that of Marcus Berg in 2017! The most expensive sale of the “clover” was and remains since 2011 that of Djibril Cisse in Lazio instead of 5.8 million euros…
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