Michailidis, Panagiotou and Tachatos were suspended. Koutsias was selected for the Under-17’s derby match against Aris. The rest of the group ha few issues in dispatching a determined OFI side and they continue to lead the way at the top of the table with a two-point gap ahead of Panathinaikos.

Pablo Garcia and Miroslav Schanauzner’s players began strongly, making their intentions against their Cretan visitors clear. For their part, the visitors were well-organised, did not lack quality in their approach, and managed to limit the home side’s scoring chances.

Despite that, PAOK had control of the game for long periods and took advantage of errors made by their opponents. Kaloutsikidis won a penalty after 28 minutes and Doumtsis opened the score from the resulting spot-kick, while on 41 minutes Kaloutsikidis also squared the ball for Tziolis to make it 2-0.

In the second half the Cretans upped their game and after 56 minutes they managed to pull a goal back but the Dikefalos tou Vorra’s response was immediate. Tziolis was the man on target, converting an assist from Gorteziani just three minutes later to make it 3-1 to PAOK, while on 62 minutes it was 4-1 when Gorteziani produced a fine individual goal.

On 83 minutes Konstantelias too advantage of an assist from Pipilaris to score from close range to make it 5-1, before OFI grabbed a consolation with five minutes left.

PAOK lineup:

Talichmanidis, Kaloutsikidis, Aventisian, Daikos, Giaxis, Tsiggaras, Salamouras, Doumtsis (68′ Konstantelias), Tziolis (80′ Pipiliaris), Panidis (58′ Grosdis), Gorteziani.