Episode 441: El Kaabi Injury Rocks Olympiacos | Volos Draw, Big Questions & What Now?

Good evening everyone.

Welcome back to Thrillos International.

My name is Costa.

I'm joined by Ari back again Sunday night here at European time.

Tonight was supposed to be about Olympiacos dropping points against Volos on matchday three.

About the performance.

Mendeleev starting 11.

The ref, decisions we made and the questions that inevitably come when Olympiacos fails to win a game like this in Greece.

But then football became secondary.

Seeing Ayub El-Kabi on the floor screaming in agony, banging his hands.

against the ground and seeing the reaction of the players around him, the opposition goalkeeper, the wall that was made around him, horrific scenes that you just don't want to see on a football field or anywhere.

Players from both teams looked shell-shocked.

You could see that our players were visibly affected in the second half.

And we're not just talking about any old Olympiakos player.

This is Ayub El-Kabi, the man whose goal took us all the way to that night in Athens in May 2024, the man who scored the goal that delivered the first European trophy for this football club making history.

So before getting into anything else tonight, our thoughts are with Ayub, We also want to address something straight away because we've seen the reaction from some supporters.

There are fans who feel that the injury is now being used as an excuse to hide behind or to somehow nullify legitimate criticism of the coach's decisions yesterday and what happened on the pitch.

We're not going to do that.

We're going to get into all of it.

Caring about Ayoub and recognizing the seriousness of what happened doesn't mean that Mendeleev, the starting 11, the performance or decisions suddenly become immune from criticism.

They're simply a time and a place for both conversations.

And we're going to have both of them tonight because there are serious questions.

Why did Mendeleev choose that starting 11? Why did Olympiacos drop points? What about the ref? What happens if El Carbi's out for a year? A year at least, if we see him back on a pitch in a year.

What does it mean for the European list? Who takes responsibility up front? Is Laormiga Gonzalez, is he ready for that? And then there's the biggest question.

perhaps the biggest question of all, can something so painful actually become a spark that lights the fuse for this team? We've gone into the season with 1-0 victory followed by a 1-0 victory followed by a drumming of Larissa in the cup and then dropping points to Volos in the third matchday.

Can this dressing room take what happened to one of its leaders, one of the legends of this club, and rally around him and say, Now we're going to fight for him as well.

So out of misfortune, can we find the unity we need? A reaction, hunger to go and win the league, show us the type of football that we think this squad is capable of producing.

So there's a lot to unpack tonight.

Olympiakos dropped points, Ayub's gone down.

mendeley bar europe what happens next so get involved in the chat give us your thoughts above everything else tonight rally for ayub as we've put in the in the thumbnail so let's get into it ari uh i i i prepped i prepped an intro but yeah i wanted to get your your first thoughts as well