Charisteas – The English (now Italian) Patient

With the winter transfer window now in full swing, the opportunity to leave 2^nd Bundesliga club Nuremberg has returned for Greece striker Angelos Charisteas. Last summer’s transfer window was a failed attempt to offload the Greece international, who had an up-and-down year in 2008 for both club and country. Now, interest in the service of Greece’s golden boy has resumed with window shopping providing plenty of speculation over where Charisteas will land in January.

In the latter weeks of July, English and German press has Charisteas heading to Premier League new boys Stoke City or Coca-Cole Championship side Ipswich. Weeks of speculation, which made its way to Greece at one point, led readers to believe Greece would have more than one member of the ‘Galanoleuki’ playing in the English top flight – the other being Hull City’s Stelios Giannakopoulos.

The move never came, even though Stoke had a firsthand encounter with their transfer target as they incidentally fell victim to a strike from Charisteas strike in a summer friendly loss to Nuremberg. Not discouraged by his club’s inability to sell him, the player mostly known for his golden goal against Portugal at the European Championships five years ago, didn’t opt out of his contract ahead of his side’s return to the second tier of German football.

Though many players are devalued whilst dropping from the glory of top flight football, to the inferior honour of the second division, this is not so for one of Greece’s most successful strikers.

Reports have now leaked that Italian pair, Chievo Verona and Bologna, are in the hunt for a striker and Charisteas is at the top of their shortlist. While Bologna is no stranger to Greek talent, most notably through the service of Greece legend Theodoros Zagorakis, it appears Chievo is the front runner for Charisteas’ services; as expected interest from England continues to filter its way through to the Frankenstadion.

With a move to Italy’s Serie A nothing but plain speculation at this point, Charisteas can only focus on helping Nuremberg make its way back to the premier level of German football. With that being said, Germany has always been rewarding for Charisteas; notably his influential role in Werder Bremen’s domestic double during the 2003-2004 season.

Despite the immense success of winning the Bundesliga title and the Deutscher Pokal with the weserstadion club in just his second season in a Bremen uniform, Charisteas was sent packing when Thomas Schaaf and company sent Charisteas to Dutch giants Ajax Amsterdam.

One season at the Amsterdam Arena was all the capital club could afford for Charisteas, who was left to be used a fifth-rate striker behind the likes of Ryan Babbel, Klass Jan Huntelaar, Markus Rosenberg and, Rydell Poepon – coincidentally all four striker have since left Ajax.

While Charisteas moved on to join Ajax’s Dutch rivals Feyenoord, Charisteas couldn’t stay away from Germany much longer. One more season in Netherlands, for a total of two between Ajax and Feyenoord, was all the time Charisteas spent in the Netherlands before returning to Germany in 2007.

Wearing the Nuremberg maroon ever since his return to Germany, if a deal is not struck this month a summer transfer will likely be the case if Nuremberg is denied a Bundesliga return at season’s end.