"Hungarian Athletic Bilbao" - a club whose policy and philosophy is to bring exclusively local players, will welcome the Sailors' football players to Paks, a town of only 20 thousand inhabitants!
It's no wonder that 2 Hungarian footballers were on the score sheet for the match between AEK Larnaca and Paksi, last week in the second leg of the 23nd round of qualification for the Conference League, and the coach, Đerđ Bognar, is also Hungarian.
It's like that, actually, in every match...
- Ever since they were promoted to the first league in the 2006/07 season and became part of the Hungarian club elite, they have not signed a contract with a foreign footballer - the well-informed Hungarian journalist Atila Benei tells "Vijesti".
Mornar will play the first match of the 3rd round of qualification for the League of Conferences tomorrow in Pakš (Pakš is a city, Pakši club). The match starts at 19:XNUMX.
After the sensational elimination of Dinamo Tbilisi in the 1st round, and even more sensational passing over Radnički from Kragujevac in the second round, Barane will face an extremely unusual opponent tomorrow in the first match of the 3rd round. And the hardest so far...
- Paksi has been in the first league for 18 years, so they haven't been relegated since they entered the first league. They made a big success last season, when they beat the big favorite, the Ferencvaros team, in the final of the Cup, on their own field. They won 2:0, fully deserved. They were also second in the championship - points out Benei.
Despite a great season on the domestic stage, Pakshi's European adventure this summer started disastrously - with a 4:0 home defeat to Romanian Cup winners Corvinul, in the 1st round of Europa League qualification.
- I was at that match and I was really surprised. But Pakši showed his true strength in the second leg, when he stabilized and won 2:0, not enough to pass, but that's why there was no dilemma against the Cypriot AEK from Larnaca in the qualifiers for the Conference League, where Pakši won 5:0 in total soon - continues the Hungarian journalist.
62-year-old Đerđ Bognar has been on the bench for four years, albeit with a short break in 2022 when he led MTK from Budapest.
- He has now found a great balance between older players with great experience and younger ones who have emerged in the team. The club somehow manages to always find good options when it comes to the open market. Clearly, the market for Hungarian players. As a rule, Paksi has a striker who is the best scorer in the league, or is at the very top of the scorers list. In the previous three seasons, it was Han, Adam and Varga. Adam had very fruitful seasons in Korea, Varga is a standard national team player, now he is in Ferencvaros - points out Benei.
The current team of Pakshi does not have a real star.
- They are strong as a team, they work perfectly as a team. They are especially strong in counterattacks - he points out.
State project? And yes and no
Pakš is a small town about 120 kilometers south of Budapest.
- Paksi has a nice, new stadium with a capacity of 4.500 seats. I think that Mornar will enjoy great hospitality - says journalist Atila Benei.
Although the club's policy is related to exclusively domestic football players, Pakši is not a classic state project, claims Benei. It is known how much the state of Hungary, led by Prime Minister Viktor Orbán, has invested in football in recent years.
- Both they are and they are not. Their fans call themselves 'Atomic Strike', and the Paks factory, which is the main Hungarian nuclear power plant, sponsors both the Hungarian football and basketball teams. However, I have to add here that Paksha is not even close to being such a big government project as, for example, Fenencvaros. Recently, also, the residents of Pakse have been in some kind of conflict with the ruling party, because the government wants to take their local income tax, which they, of course, do not agree with.
Benei emphasizes that Pakši is an extremely decent club, as are the people at its head.
- As long as I can remember, the president has been a woman - it is Judit Balog. There are really nice people in the club, who believe in long-term work.
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