Jonsson: “How do you win the Cup with ten players? Everyone is running more than 2 km…”

THE Jens Jonson admits to AEK TV that he did not have the opportunity before AEK to play for titles and last season he enjoyed it.

The Danish midfielder also gives the recipe for playing and winning a cup final with one less player!

The derbies every three days…

“It was nice. Such big matches are one of the reasons why you come to such a big club like AEK, to fight for the championship against other big teams. It was very exciting. Full stadiums every three days and although it was difficult it is definitely what we are fighting for.”

First and best…

“There were many defining moments, not just one. Certainly the victory against Aris when Panathinaikos dropped points was decisive, but after 36 matches in the league there is no such thing as luck. The best team is on top. With more points, with the same but goal difference doesn’t matter. You can’t take anything away from the team that finishes in first place.”

There is no luck…

“I think overall we handled it smartly. Of course ten points behind is a lot. We certainly thought it would be difficult. We had to take the games one by one and wait for Panathinaikos to lose points. And they did! We were effective, we played amazingly from the winter until the end of the season and I think we deserved it. As I said again, it’s not luck to finish first after a long season.”

When you change an eleven and win Olympiakos…

“I’m not the one to say that… We think we have a really great team. With many fantastic players. We also showed during the season that the coach could even change an eleven and beat Olympiakos. Something that shows the depth and quality we have. Some are better at something specific, some are better for specific matches…”

We wanted to give back…

“No, no… In general I think you have to follow the rules. You can’t ignore them. If these conversations did anything, it was to give us more motivation. To return the blows and show that we are the best team. We footballers prefer to show it on the pitch and that’s what we did.”

Everything but the music…

“Definitely the best thing for me in my first season in Greece was winning the championship and being part of this great team. They were amazing. I hadn’t played to win titles before. Amazing new stadium. Fans, what can I say… I’ve played in Turkey where there are also a lot of fans, but ours is another level. Something I’ve never seen before. Like I said the championship, to be part of this great team, amazing technical team, amazing staff. Very pleased from day one. If I should find something I don’t like? The music… I don’t like it. Everything else is amazing.”

I wasn’t here then, I knew we were the best

“When you haven’t had the experience of losing finals, you can’t really think about it. We certainly knew this existed, but I personally wasn’t here at the time and wasn’t thinking about it. We had a lot of confidence going into that match. We had shown during the season that we were a very good team, we had won the league, so we didn’t think about it. But certainly PAOK is also a great team and anything could happen. But even with them we deserved the victory.”

A few more kilometers each…

“How do you win a ten-man final from the first minute? It’s a good question. As I said we have a very good team, everyone works for each other. It was a difficult situation, basically ninety minutes with one player less, but everyone stepped up, they did two kilometers more than they would have done, we helped each other, an amazing team effort”.

The same and even more…

“I hope the same and even more are ahead of us. We cannot celebrate again this year because we are the champions of the previous season. It’s another season. Last season is not forgotten, but it was last season. A big club like AEK fights for the title every year, that’s what we intend to do this year as well and I hope we will do it. Of course there is also the Champions League, it’s a big goal, we all want to play there and I hope we will.”