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Friendly: Greece - Switzerland (23 March 2018, OAKA , Athens)


Dutch Eagle

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Fortounis and Socrates were our worst players today. I forgive Socrates for his soft man marking but Fortounis hasn't done anything in a long while. I don't understand why he doesn't start Pelkas from the beginning and give the kid a go and see what the kid can do especially playing with Donis who in my opinion was the only one running his ass off out there today along with Zeca. What is the kid going to do when he comes on in the 77th minute? This guy Skibbe is starting to get on my nerves. Also he said he would try Koulouris and Limnios. Koulouris came on in the 73rd minute and Limnios didn't play! As another poster said earlier, he called three LB's, Lykogiannis, Stafylidis and Tzavellas and he starts Retsos at LB. This guy is a moron.

 

 

Edited by Makynia
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Greece had a 10 year run of form that included 3 Euro appearances (1 championship, 1 quarterfinal) and 2 WC appearances (1 round of 16). Realistically, with the type of football that Greece played coupled with the quality of their players, they likely overachieved in that time span and had a lot of things that had to go their way, such as relatively easy group draws and scraping out 1-0 wins (who remembers that game vs Slovakia where the only goal was the blunder by the GK?! haha). EPO, the players and whomever else should have known that the run of luck and "park the bus to win" was going to end sooner or later and that they would have to step up their game if they wanted to make regular appearances at major tournaments.

 

Where did all the money and exposure from these tournaments go? Why wasn't any of this reinvested in Greek football? The 2014 WC squad reportedly gave their bonuses to the EPO for better training facilities and investment, but what happened with that? The problems with the NT are merely a symptom of what I believe to be a much larger problem. There's no proper investment, vision, or cooperation to produce technically skilled players that can elevate Greece to the next level. Look at Iceland, population of 300k but they put a plan in place and it's paid off for them now two tournament cycles in a row; same can be said for Germany and the changes they made over 10 years ago.

 

And it's all such a shame too. You have probably one of the best CB trios in the world along with a 4th CB who is going to be a star someday and a very good striker in MItroglou but the pieces around them are severely lacking and thus their NT careers are being wasted.

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3 hours ago, J1078 said:

The sad thing is the line up that we started with will be pretty much the line the Skibbe would choose in important qualifier games... I think we all need t face the fact that we just aren't a good team with an even worse coach... As much as it hurts to say i cant see things changing anytime soon..

We can be a ok to good team but the team Skibbe is setting up is horrible. When Lazaros, Bakakis, Kourbelis and Pelkas came on, these were running, running with ball and into space, Bakakis was so much better than Torosidis, we then had no left back - even when the idiot picked 3 left backs!! We have a hopeless coach who is killing us. Kourbelis and Pelkas ran into spaces and made us look different too

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3 hours ago, Ellada2004 said:

Nova commentator saying it was a great performance by all Greek players and things look bright going forward for Euro 2020 qualifying, really?

F*** me dead... Look, we looked ok in part of the first half but besides Donis IMO, the other players did not do anything with the possession. Fortounis was brutal, Bakasetas is not a winger etc...

 

Only when the subs came on in the last 15-10 mins did we look ok IMO

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1 hour ago, Makynia said:

Fortounis and Socrates were our worst players today. I forgive Socrates for his soft man marking but Fortounis hasn't done anything in a long while. I don't understand why he doesn't start Pelkas from the beginning and give the kid a go and see what the kid can do especially playing with Donis who in my opinion was the only one running his ass off out there today along with Zeca. What is the kid going to do when he comes on in the 77th minute? This guy Skibbe is starting to get on my nerves. Also he said he would try Koulouris and Limnios. Koulouris came on in the 73rd minute and Limnios didn't play! As another poster said earlier, he called three LB's, Lykogiannis, Stafylidis and Tzavellas and he starts Retsos at LB. This guy is a moron.

 

 

Again I agree with all your points, I was the one that pointed out the 3 left backs but as only Skibbe can do... He starts a right back/center back at left back and not 1 left back!!!  This says it all for Skibbe... we are been managed by a complete idiot guys, the writing has been on the wall for some time now

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5 hours ago, J1078 said:

Completely agree.. we are wasting our time with this coach.. even tho we need to improve our rankings we need to try some young blood in certain positions.. let’s not waste our friendless for nothing... I don’t see anything changing with Skibbe behind the bench he is a stubborn guy and I really don’t think he knows the Greek talent pool at all..

The Greek what?

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Another disheartening performance of the Ethniki. Strange call-ups and decisions continue.

The pros: Zeca ran like hell, Karnezis made a fine save in the second half, Pelkas tried and shew the adequate spirit in that 17 minutes he got, even Lazaros was an (albeit minor) threat. The cons: Bakasetas was horrible, Kourbelis & Koulouris shouldnt have been called up at all, especially the last one was abysmal, maybe he didnt even touch the ball! Even Sokratis made some faults.

Several defenders (Torosidis Manolas Retsos Bakakis) were okay but we couldnt score to save our lives. At least Karelis would have subbed on for Mitroglou. I really think Samaras would be more dangerous even in his present state than some of our "talented" forwards (Koulouris Limnios Bakasetas, well almost everybody except for Mitroglou and Karelis).

Yes Santos and Rehhagels team didnt play in a spectacular way but they fought hard, thats why they achieved great results. The Skibbe team plays in a neat way and it shows occasionally some skill but has not too much grit. Perhaps Skibbe should be sacked but I think EPO is too much afraid to do that. Then they should look for a new coach who could be another Ranieri (big name idiot) or Markarian (the old man who looked like a penguin).

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Some necessary changes in the squad before the Egypt game:

Goalkeepers: Karnezis (Watford), Konstantopoulos (Middlesbrough), Chalkias (Panachaiki)

Defenders: Torosidis (Bologna), Pliatsikas (Platanias), Manolas (Roma), Papastathopoulos (Dortmund), Lykogiannis (Cagliari), Siovas (Leganes), Retsos (Leverkusen), Papadopoulos (Hamburg), Vyntra (Omonia Nicosia), Moras (Larisa), Avraam (Brisbane Roar), Malezas (PAOK)

Midfielders: Tachtsidis (Olympiacos), Maniatis (Alanyaspor), Pelkas (PAOK), Petsos (Rapid Wien), Zeca (FC Kobenhavn), Makos (Trikala), Fortounis (Olympiacos), Christodoulopoulos (AEK)

Strikers: Mitroglou (Marseille), Karelis (Genk), Gianniotas (Valladolid), Donis (Stuttgart)

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@La Mendel Makos, Petsos, Pliatsikas, Vyntra and Avraam don't deserve to be anywhere in this team. Chalkias really?

Torosidis was one of the worst players today. Bakakis is better and he proved that. We can't just have experienced players for the sake of it. They have to be at least decent. Sokratis, Mitroglou, Karnezis and Samaris should be the senior players.

Manolas and Retsos played good. Retsos looked stable. Sokratis didn't play well. Fortounis didn't play well. There was one chance where Mitroglou put Bakasetas through and instead of shooting he passed it back to him. 

Donis full of pace but no end product. He has to work on his end product then we will score goals. Zeca was one of our best players. Pelkas was really aggressive which was good to see. Kourbelis didn't do well today but was running into space. 

 

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here's highlights we did have some really good chances 3-5 of them. Fortounis could have had 2 goals. First outside box shot and second where he skied it in the 6 yard box. Mitroglou lost his footing twice for really good chances too. We also should have got a penalty on Pelkas he got bulldozed off the pitch.

 

Edited by georgelaz
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Fortounis does get some quality chances from time to time but honestly he looks like one of our laziest players that kind of sucks the energy out of the team.. yes he is a good player but rarely shows it for the national team.. I think Pelkas should be given more opportunities going forward. Baks should not be a starter for this team as he is just s%$#!...  Samaris shows flashes but mostly disappoints and his pass selection and giveaway from time to time is mind blowing...  Donis is one player that brings a lot of energy and speed and usually creates something for us... Mitro is our go to go but such a one dimensional player that cant do anything else but score from time to time... We cant score goals and we hardly get any shots on target, our offence looks horrible yet we don't give a guy a shot that scores regularly that has great ball control and some speed in Fetfa.... This is crazy... Skibbe has no system and no clue of what to do out there and what players to choose.. We seriously cant move forward with him here.....  The fact that he said in his press conference he was very pleased on how we played and he felt very positive just shows me how much of a useless coach he is..

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While Fortounis might be good in SuperLeague, he has just been a total dud for the national team. Never flashes, makes the wrong play too often, never creates. That spot is a total disaster right now, and I think a big part of what has kept the attacks from becoming anywhere near threatening. 

 

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^Exactly that’s why I’m saying I would give Pelkas a shot over him.. bottom line it hasn’t worked out for us with fortounis.. His position is so critical in setting up our attack that he just can’t cut it.. we need to look at different options... He cant drive our offence as we’ve seen... I like the guy but he’s not working out for such a big role on the NT..

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8 hours ago, J1078 said:

Fortounis does get some quality chances from time to time but honestly he looks like one of our laziest players that kind of sucks the energy out of the team.. yes he is a good player but rarely shows it for the national team.. I think Pelkas should be given more opportunities going forward. Baks should not be a starter for this team as he is just s%$#!...  Samaris shows flashes but mostly disappoints and his pass selection and giveaway from time to time is mind blowing...  Donis is one player that brings a lot of energy and speed and usually creates something for us... Mitro is our go to go but such a one dimensional player that cant do anything else but score from time to time... We cant score goals and we hardly get any shots on target, our offence looks horrible yet we don't give a guy a shot that scores regularly that has great ball control and some speed in Fetfa.... This is crazy... Skibbe has no system and no clue of what to do out there and what players to choose.. We seriously cant move forward with him here.....  The fact that he said in his press conference he was very pleased on how we played and he felt very positive just shows me how much of a useless coach he is..

Skibbe tries to imitate Rehhagel (closed club policy, essentially defensive tactics), he even seeked his advice but 1) he picks the wrong players again and again, 2) he plays them sometimes in the wrong position (Zeca on the wing, Maniatis as a fullback), 3) he makes stupid changes (yesterday Donis was subbed off, Bakasetas remained on the pitch, Lazaros got only half an hour, Koulouris came in for Mitroglou instead of Karelis etc. etc.). Rehhagel is a famous coach of the last fifty years (alongside the likes of Sacchi, Mourinho, Ferguson, Michels, Carlos Bianchi, Guardiola), Skibbe will be always only a feeble imitation of that legendary trainer. All in all, the performance of the team reflects the personality of the manager as somebody said here after the Croatia game. This is not a group of fighters but a rather dull side that sometimes simply cannot score.

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To be fair, Skibbe is not a hopeless case. Zeca was added to the squad by him. He has wanted to secure the services of Villafanez too (we really need some attacking midfielders beside Fortounis and Pelkas, who seems to be a promising NT player). And I can even understand EPO that they are afraid to hire a new coach who could be easily another Ranieri, Markarian or Tsanas (that is, worse than Skibbe). There are not many coaches right now who know Greek football and are available. Santos, Valverde and Jardim have their jobs now. Only Míchel is available (he was sacked by Malaga in January), could he be the right solution?

Edited by La Mendel
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Just now, La Mendel said:

Tsanas (that is, worse than Skibbe). There are not many coaches right now who know Greek football and are available. Santos, Valverde and Jardim have their jobs now. Only Míchel is available (he was sacked by Malaga in January), could he be the right solution?

Tsanas is our assistant... :confused:

There are many coaching teams that can do better than these two clowns tbh

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I think Skibbe has learned the "closed club" idea from Rehhagel (they met earlier I think) and Bakasetas is a member of his group of players who will be always there unless theyre injured. The idea in itself would be good but choosing Bakasetas to be a member of that group is really silly. That guy cannot play regularly for AEK (an average side at international level, or should I say Greek league is average?) even after the injury of Mantalos (they have one CAM less). Of course, such a choice shows his limits.

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13 minutes ago, Alphonse said:

Tsanas is our assistant... :confused:

There are many coaching teams that can do better than these two clowns tbh

My God yes. I have quite forgotten it. I saw him during the game on the bench and I kept asking myself "Who is this? I saw him already but I cant remember his name". :)

Edited by La Mendel
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