Olympiacos vs Fiorentina: probable lineups

Olympiacos and Fiorentina will face each other today in the 2023-24 Conference League final at the OPAP Arena stadium in Athens.

The consecration of José Luis Mendilibar as a great coach in Europe will come in today’s final, in which he will face Fiorentina, a team eager for revenge after losing last season’s final, a tough test for the Greek team, which will play its first European final in its history.

Winner and figure of last year’s Europa League, in which he led Sevilla to glory by beating Roma on penalties in the final, Mendilibar arrived at the Greek Piraeus in February as a free agent after being fired by the Spanish club. There, on the other side of Europe, he has once again become a protagonist in the football of the ‘Old Continent’ with an Olympiacos that plays in his image and likeness.

SECOND FINAL IN TWO YEARS

In the semifinals, he overtook Unai Emery and his Aston Villa to take the red and white club to its first European final. Mendi’s second in less than a year. They may not be the favorites, but with Zaldívar at the helm, nothing can be taken for granted. And even less so playing “at home”, in the OPAP Arena of the Greek capital.

On the Fiorentina bench will be Vincenzo Italiano, one of the most valued coaches in Italy. A case similar to that of Gian Piero Gasperini, coach of Atalanta and brand new champion of the Europa League, because he is missing a title to materialize his great work in Florence, something that Gasperini has already achieved.

The ‘Fiore’ has no outstanding accounts with Olympiacos, but it does with the Conference League. Last season they fell just short after losing in the final to West Ham, just a week after losing the Coppa Italia final.

This season they fell just short of the cup final, but after beating Belgian side Bruges in the semifinals they reached the European final.