Schwab: “Let’s make a good first step in Toumba against Beitar”

In the belief that his team should have PAOK by itself mentioned the Stefan Schwab.

The central midfielder of the “black and white” gave an interview to the show OPEN SPORT and he talked about the preparation, the matches with Beitar, the experience of the games with Levski Sofias and the special role he has within the team, as one of the most experienced to guide the children who are integrated from the academy to the first team .

“The most important thing is for the team to believe in itself and that’s what we’re doing. We work hard, we have daily training, sometimes in double training, so now we are working on our fitness and preparing for the season.

The team has changed a bit, we got some new players who haven’t played so far, we are trying to integrate them into the team. The most important thing is to have positive energy, I know there are a lot of rumors around but as long as the players and the manager are positive we will be ready for the season“, said, initially, the central midfielder of the “double-headed team of the North”.

– Was the experience with Levski last summer a bittersweet one, a lesson you learned?

“You know these games are always hard and tough, there is no longer a huge difference between the big teams and the small teams. In football almost anything can happen now. We will have to be focused, as we saw last year away from Levski, in the first 15 minutes we conceded two goals and could not qualify. So we have to at our… home in Toumba to put on a good performance, win this game, make a good first step, so it’s our turn to start the game well and push them with our fans to get a good result in the first encounter which is the half step».

– Do you, Zivkovic, Augusto, Andre, Tyson have one more responsibility besides playing well and leading the group?



“Of course players like the ones you mentioned help us all, they help new players and that makes us happy. For me there are no young or older players, there are footballers with more and less quality. Every quality player helps us, so we are happy when we are all available and fit».

– PAOK has the best academy in Greece. How do you rate the transition of these kids from youth to men’s football?

“The young Greeks are important for Greek football, for Thessaloniki from the fans’ point of view, that they have children from the city, from the academy, it’s really good. And of course they have quality, you can see that the new players help us, everyone who comes in makes us a better team. I think from what I have seen so far that our young people are professionals, they try, work and train hard. The advice to young people is to be patient and believe in yourself every day and never give up because in football there are ups and downs and especially in the “down” you have to have a strong mentality to fight to come back and then everything will be alright».

-Was there interest from Austria and Rapid?

“It is difficult to find Austrian footballers with quality because most of them play abroad, so Austrian clubs are always looking for good footballers from the country. And yes, Rapid, my former club knows that I still have one year left on my contract with PAOK. At some point they contacted me, but my future is here, I have a contract next year, at the moment he is physically fine and we will see, but yes I have a contract with PAOK, I am happy here and the team knows it».