Jump to content
Phantis Forums

Road To Russia 2018 FIFA World Cup


Recommended Posts

there's no luck here. Croatia beat Spain the defending champs, which Portugal beat. Wales beat Belgium a heavy favour to win the whole thing. Portugal basically beat Belgium and Spain by beating the people who beat them in a way.

 

It depends on your perspective, but their success is not mostly because of luck. It's because Santos is one of the best international managers, RONALDO, a golden generation, and chemistry.

 

With all due respect, Croatia had the better chances that game and probably should have won. Credit to Portugal though, they kept holding and eventually eked it out at the end. IMHO, if you replayed that match 10 times, Croatia probably wins more than they lose. As for Wales, let's not forget they were without Ramsay for the semi-final which is obviously a huge loss for them. I also don't subscribe to the theory that if you beat team "x" who previously beat team "y" then you've essentially beat team "y". Teams stack up and match up differently; ex: France beat Germany who previously beat Italy; that doesn't mean that France would automatically beat Italy.  

 

Portugal are indeed a talented team and are blessed to have one of the best players in the world, but that does not change the fact that they've played poorly throughout a large part of this tournament (for which some of the blame can be laid at the feet of the manager) and that they've had an easy path to the final, lucky or not I guess it depends on your perspective ;)

 

While the perception is that Santos did not "develop" talent, we have to remember that is not his job.  That is the job of the club teams and EPO.  My biggest grip with him was that he played Katsouranis and Karagounis regardless of form. Their leadership though is what he valued and it showed.  Whether you like him or not, he did go 17 games without a loss (regardless of whom we played) and will go down as the 1st or 2nd best manager in Greece's history.

 

I'm not sure if this was directed at me but I wanted to clarify that when I said "blooding the younger generation in" I did not mean develop players. What I meant was getting these players into the line-ups sooner to get some NT games under their belts, create chemistry, build a system, etc. The time to really do this was during friendlies leading up to tournaments. This might have allowed us to have a few guys ready to step in when those times came that Kats, Kara, etc were in poor form or not playing for their clubs. I have a theory (and again, I have no evidence for this, it's just a theory so take it for what it's worth): I think Santos knew he was leaving and really didn't care much about the future or planning for the post-Kats/Kara era. Come WC14 he went with what he knew and who he trusted. Ironically, his hand was forced by injuries/suspensions and guys like Samaris and Christodoulopoulos stepped up during the Ivory Coast game, and the rest is history. 

 

The record speaks for itself....He's the second most successful Greek coach in history, and was the first to get us past the group stages in the world cup!!! To simply put, Greece over achieved during Santos years. Some of you in here have trouble understanding that Greece does not have the talent for TEKI TAKA football....And players like Fetfa are losers and will cost you goals against in the long run. Ninis another lazy bum, you build with guts and heart my friends!!!!

 

I would challenge you to point out one poster who has advocated that we play tiki-taka football. It's ok, I'll wait. Regarding our style of play, I think some posters here may have trouble understanding the difference between sound, defensive, counter-attacking football (see Greece 2004) and dysfunctional donkey-ball. As for building a team, it doesn't have to be mutually exclusive. It takes hard-working, disciplined, AND talented players. 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

With all due respect to Ellas, jvc, what I want to know is what would have Santos done differently? Ellas is just saying Santos is better than the managers we have had since he left and we would have qualified for this Euro, my question is what would have he done differently to what we saw? A different midfield??

 

As I said many years ago, and as aek66 & Reaper point out, he is a big part for our now failure. We had in form players who could have been gelled into the Ethniki but instead we had to watch meaningless friendlies with Kats walking along Tziolis forking out 1-0 wins some how. The last friendly before WC 14 vs Portugal (0-0) we did nothing until Fetfa came on and nearly won it himself. Kats then went on to play in India and a game for Heidelberg in Melbourne lol 

 

1.Santos wouldnt try to play offensively

2. Santos wouldnt put non-wingers players at winger positions. If he HAD to play wingers , he would play wingers there, not Diamantakos , and certainly not Mavrias.

3. Santos would lock the match against finland at 1-0 and wouldnt end up drawing.

4. Santos wouldnt run confused by calling in the NT every footballer who is elidgible for Greece

5. Santos wouldnt lose the dressing rooms. Players respected him for his qualifying campaigns and his achievements on Euro 12 and WC 14.

but most importantly and which is exactly what happened:

6. Santos would not stay for a corrupt Greek Federation.

  • Like it 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Comments in bold.

 

1.Santos wouldnt try to play offensively I don't know, I was pretty offended by his way of playing
2. Santos wouldnt put non-wingers players at winger positions. If he HAD to play wingers , he would play wingers there, not Diamantakos , and certainly not Mavrias. Oh, like Dpaps (twice)? Or Lazaros? Or Kone?

3. Santos would lock the match against finland at 1-0 and wouldnt end up drawing. Well that sounds easy. Would this be by decree?
4. Santos wouldnt run confused by calling in the NT every footballer who is elidgible for Greece Instead, he'd call just a handful of pappoudes

5. Santos wouldnt lose the dressing rooms. Players respected him for his qualifying campaigns and his achievements on Euro 12 and WC 14.

but most importantly and which is exactly what happened: Already happened
6. Santos would not stay for a corrupt Greek Federation. Already happened

Link to comment
Share on other sites

5.He never lost the dressing rooms. Players almost f*cked up the team psychology after the PAOK-OSFP incident and he fixed it HIMSELF.
6.Thanks for pointing out that it already happened captain obivous, he left and the corruption grew, its probably his fault the whole corrupt thing didnt make a big bam while he was the coach, because he obviously didnt let them do what they wanted.
2.Lazaros is a winger, Kone never exactly played as a winger, more like an attacking midfielder in the right half of the pitch, we didnt really see anyone else apart from Samaras and Salpigides and fetfatzidis.
Salpigidis was good at his age, keeping him for an extra year proves the lack of players in those positions.
 

Your comments are nice, I give you 10/10 for trying, but i only want to see Results.
Santos : Got us to 8 of the Euro
Almost got us to 8 of the WC

The others who trusted the new generation: Won a place in my heart.

Resultwise (and thats the only criteria, not just comments of

Edited by Rockafeller Skank
  • Like it 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

He didn't. Maniatis and Tzavellas were throwing punches at each other during training in Brazil. Santos later said the team spirit was toxix during the WC as did other players. Dressing room was lost I am afraid - Santos admitted as much HIMSELF. 

 

I have seen articles talking about Santos bringing Tzavellas and Maniatis together and having a talk the 3 of them.

You can't like everybody, All you have to do is be professional , and obviously Maniatis was, as he was not giving a F*** and playing as good as he can. We made it to the R16 this is a success. Im not sure if you can call the dressing room lost when you see our players playing basketball and having fun in videos (ofc thats just the truth they want the people to see) during the WC. Their tryharding as a team in all 4 games proves u wrong. The fact that none of them came out and blamed Gekas (even if they wanted to do exactly that) proves u wrong again.

  • Like it 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

santos was a crappy manager

 

he made a lot of mistakes

 

How can you soar like an eagle when you fly with TURKEYS..and that is a shot at the EPO not the ROSTER. Santos is showing with a better roster he can still make them play great defensive football and hit on the counter..if our CLOWNS had scoring boots Santos would have taken Greece to the 8 of a WC and 2nd guessing game decisions is easy from the couch or after a game. Give the guy some credit. I will be rooting for him tomorrow.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

He didn't. Maniatis and Tzavellas were throwing punches at each other during training in Brazil. Santos later said the team spirit was toxic during the WC as did other players. Dressing room was lost I am afraid - Santos admitted as much HIMSELF. 

 

Could be the only mistake he made that tournament..both players should have been sent home..but the EPO stinks.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Yes, Santos has a great knack for not knowing his own best team going into a tournament, favoring experience and perceived solidity over pace and skill, but usually finds his hand forced into playing the backups.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Yes that's why we saw players like chalkias and avraam at euro 2012 and gekas and Katsouranis in Brazil...definitely the best options ????????????

 

I agree with your point but I should note that when the cup came around, Gekas was in much better form than Mitroglou, who should not even have made the team.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

As we saw, the euro qualifiers were our time for rebuilding, you can't predict exactly when it will happen, but when it comes stand aside and hope it doesn't take too long. That was the worst preparation I've seen of a team at this level, leading into the Romania match. A new coach, retirements, players without clubs, injuries, and marriage breakdowns. It all came to a head right after WC '14. At least it came after.

 

As the talent pool isn't as Germany's, it take longer to regroup. Lets see if the Pirates are ready in this period of time. Santos could of phased in some talent off the bench on occasion, and played Fetfa or even Taxi instead of being defensive, at crucial moments of certain matches. A notable stricker to the previous world cup could of made a difference in close international games.

 

On the other hand Santos is dogged, ultra conservative though gets the best out of the players he is I charge of, he went at the right time. It might of all gone downhill for him with the team, after the WC, undoing all the good memories of the high achievements of the WC campaign. Then, we would of been calling for his sacking, then getting Ranieri around November '14.  

 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Santos is an excellent manager period. His record with our NT speaks for itself and now he has taken a good (but not spectacular) Portugal side to the final where hardly anyone perdicted them to even get passed Croatia. He does have one of the greatest footballer on his roster but doing it with older players like Bruno Alves & Carvalho, and giving Renato Sanches an opportunity in which he has taken and been fantastic has been great to watch. Also bringing back journeyman Quaresma who was kept out of the last WCUP by Bento and scored the winner vs Croatia.

 exactly. Santos has no fear in playing a 32 year old winger in Queresma & a 38 CB in Carvalho. He's using the same strategy is he did with Greece. Putting experience at a premium. This + he has the luxury of the best players in the world.

 

Santos is the perfect international manager. He's contrarian. Stoic. And values winning in the big picture.

 

I think Portugal MIGHT get blown out in the final like 2-0 but I still stand by that.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

The Zikos exclusion is the most confusing for sure. In retrospect our 2004 team was a dream team. Still having a great squad without Zikos, Stoltidis, Georgiadis, and an injured Tsiartsas in the final.

 

"Katsouranis is one of the best players I ever trained in my professional career" - Fernando Santos (football coach) about Katsouranis.[34]

 

 

Renato Sanchez I think gets the 'exception to the rule pass'. He started over Samaris in the champions league knock out rounds to Bayern at 18. That speaks volumes right there.

Edited by georgelaz
Link to comment
Share on other sites

I suggest you read the post more carefully then cause it's not like that at all it's just a debate about Santos's time on the Greek bench

 

I suggest you read the post more carefully. Im talking about Santos in Greece as well and pointing out that for all this sh!t that we re watching our NT go through the last 2 years, he was the reason it didn't happen earlier.

This final proves yet again how good of a coach he is. When Ronaldo is missing , he won the game.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

You guys can say what you want about Santos, but having his team play solid defence and catch teams on the counter and in set pieces WON them the Euro with out Rinaldo. Portugal had no business winning this tournament. One thing I can say about Santos is that he he new what our weakness were so he played to our strengths just as he did with Portugal.

  • Like it 2
Link to comment
Share on other sites

You guys can say what you want about Santos, but having his team play solid defence and catch teams on the counter and in set pieces WON them the Euro with out Rinaldo. Portugal had no business winning this tournament. One thing I can say about Santos is that he he new what our weakness were so he played to our strengths just as he did with Portugal.

 

Some posters believe that is not enough however! As long as he doesnt step on the field to shoot the ball himself he is of no praise in any achievement his team/s manage to make! Please say sorry to those posters and tell them you didn't mean it.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Santos is in part the reason why it happened. And to show this I'll create an expansive thread to show why Greece has faltered and how to correct it.

 

Disagreed. Fully Disagreed. Tachtsidis is one of the players u guys use as an example. You question Santos for not taking him earlier in the Katsouranis position. Its been like what , 2-3 years since Tachtsidis has been a

  • Like it 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

lol I remember a poster in the old greeksoccer forums stating Katsouranis is 'the Greek Pirlo'.

 

It was kinda jokes but he is in a way. Or the Greek Gerrard. If England started Gerrard I think they would have faired better. Despite him playing in MLS

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Dutch Eagle pinned, unpinned and locked this topic
Guest
This topic is now closed to further replies.
  • Recently Browsing   0 members

    No registered users viewing this page.


×
×
  • Create New...