Abel Ferreira and his players came into this match in decisive mood. After the defeat by Aris, everyone at the club has been putting in the work both physically and mentally. The ‘recovery’ began with the emphatic victory over OFI, and continued tonight with a well-earned victory over AEK as PAOK claimed three very important points.

The match was nothing special in terms of quality in the first half, with the Dikefalos tou Vorra enjoying the lion’s share of possession as well as the few dangerous moments in front of goal with Karol Swiderski, Diego Biseswar and Dimitris Limnios all unable to beat Vassilis Barkas in the AEK goal.

In the second half, however, PAOK upped the tempo, turned up the pressure, and got into dangerous areas much more. All of this came to a head after 57 minutes when the goal which judged the outcome of the match finally came. Initially, Barkas stopped another Swiderski effort, but the ball fell kinly for Vierinha. AEK’s Andre Simoes fouled his compatriot for Portugal, however, which resulted in a penalty award. The Leader himself stepped up to take the spot-kick and made no mistake from 1 yards to make it 1-0.

The visitors tried their best to react, and they managed to make headway into the final third and force Zivko Zivkovic to make two solid saves, while the Serbian keeper was also thankful for the frame of his goal when Petros Mantalos came close to equalizing.

PAOK missed a great opportunity to make it 2-0 when Biseswar fired wide from close range, while AEK had Niklas Hult and Marko Livaja sent off in added time.

A packed Toumba celebrated a hugely important win for the club which moved second-placed PAOK back to within a single point of leaders Olympiacos.

Team lineups:

PAOK: Zivkovic, Matos, Varela, Ingason, Giannoulis, Esiti, Misic, Limnios, Vierinha (79′ Pelkas ), Biseswar (87′ Mauricio), Swiderski (74′ Akpom).

ΑΕΚ: Barkas, Chygrynskiy, Vranjes, Bakakis, Krisicic, Sambanazovic (64′ Oliveira), Simoes, Mantalos, Livaja, Verde (83′ Giakoumakis).