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You cannot compare Red star to Man City, because Man City have actually done some of significance in football since 1991. Bosnia has done nothing of significance since 2004, when we won a major tournament. What`s Bosnia`s most significant win? I can give you 10 Greece wins in the last 10 years that are bigger than that. Just 2 years a go we were a hair away from World Cup wuarter finals and Bosnia was at home watching the game on TV. I mean you are trying to compare Greece`s success this generation, with things that happened in the 70s. And if you want to belittle our 95th minute goal, I can say you needed an own goal to draw with us. Come now, you burrying yourself in a hole. It will take years and massive leaps in the international stage for Bosnia to come close to Greece`s pedigree. A good place to start in this campagn. Let us talk in June.

Disgusting post.

We had a bad campaign, transition period, 3 different coaches and ball didn`t bounce for us. We have obviously come out of that funk. But, No, we did not play well. If you wanna highlight friendlies, we also just beat Netherlands 2 months ago. You cannot compare pedigree. You can feel good if Bosnia wins in June that`s it. Give me Bosnia`s biggest ever win, EVER, and I will give you 10 Greece wins that are greater without even touching Euro 2004.

Greece won 12 years ago, not 40 like Nottingham. Some of the players from our championship team retired just last year. Since Euro 2004 there has been way more positives than negatives, and we have won qualifying groups handily, massive playoff games, and have consistently qualified for major tournaments and advancing past group stages. Why are you trying to argue this, it`s a losing battle. You are much better off trying to compare these teams in the now.

Look, Bosnia is not backwater by any means, they are a good team, but their pedigree is still way below Greece. We had a bad campaign during a trasition period in the last qualifiers, that`s all. If you would like, I can go through Bosnia`s record as well and point out all the times they failed and have done nothing of significance, ever, in the international stage, while Greece was winning European Championships and consistently qualifying for big tournaments. We cannot compare resumés. What we can do, however, is compare these teams in the present. It will be fun seeing them go neck and neck for that playoff spot.

I respect Bosnia as a team they played well with a lot of grit. The fan or fans that disrepected Bosnia with the Genocide banner shot be banned from future games this is unacceptable

Greece = not overly talented but tough team, physical, disciplined, knows what they want on the pitch, defensive, "ugly" football and many games with 1 or zero goals, constantly try to provoke opponents and talk to the referees, will try to fake fouls in every occasion.(Don't get me wrong, I don't have anything against this game style, it's still legit way to play this game). Bosnia = talented team, they can pass the ball and dribble, but not the most disciplined team out there and a bit of naive, also most of players can't run as much is it needed. Seems like we can't play defensive football, even in a Belgium away game we tried to attack them from the first minute, which didn't ended well. When we(Bosnia) played on our way we looked like a Real Madrid towards Tenerife. But our team allowed Greeks to provoke them(lol at Džeko), turn into game with high tensions, hot temper, nervousness, fights...which perfectly suits Greek players, but our players are not made for that. Naive, naive, we let Greeks to turn game into their style. Also we tried to "steal a time" and it was obviously we aren't really good at that, Greeks would be much better in that situation. In a rematch our players must play with "cold heads", because we can beat Greeks in a good football match, but we can't beat team in a open fight on a pitch. And we must score, we missed so many opportunities in this game, same with previous Cyprus game. If our team miss two or three good opportunities versus Greece in Bosnia, we will be punished from counter attack or a lucky shoot, it happens all the time, especially when your opponent is a Greece. I'm a bit of worried, couple of our players said that they "can't wait" for a rematch like they are mad on someone and not just in a football sense, it's good there is so much time before rematch, they will cold their heads untill that. Trying to beat Greeks in a nervous and "this time it's personal" game is same as trying to beat Barcelona with tiki - taka.

Thanks for your input now Go Away!

Bosnia are a good football team....and play good football.. I care little for the Serb brotherhood...rubbish.. However your coaches names is Mehmet you need to understand that Greeks see this is the eternal enemy..no sugar coating..you say people in Zenica won't forget what happened in a football game...but the people of Hellas will never forget Mehmet..

Can we just talk about the game and leave out the political BS

Full Match Preview incoming. We played poorly, I agree, but not as poorly as everyone decides to propose we did. Second half I saw one chance from Bosnia and 3-4 good ones from us. DEFENCE:Ibisevic, Dzeko, Pjanic , Lulic they are world class , all of them. And what did they really get? Their crucial chances were a Pjanic shot at 75' and a lucky static shot at the woodwork. You make it look like their other chances were awesome. Our defence , kept only one lucky goal from that offence, and with one of our starter CBs missing. Maniatis and Samaris were very poor offensively, in fact they were very poor in total, but they never left their defensive duties unattended. The only mistakes I give our defence are 2, and both go to our best player: a) Sokratis failing an offside trap on Dzeko, but shortly after making up for it. b) Sokratis making a foul for almost no reason (since help was comming from Stafylidis in less than 2 clicks o time) which gave them the lead. MIDFIELD: Lost from the beginning, poor game from Samaris, Maniatis running up and down but really nothing useful with the ball on his feet. I really hope Zeka takes Maniatis spot as he is the exactly same type of player (running up and down marking players, and not the best option to help offensively). Tachtsidis creativity would have given us more up front and far more chances. I really believe the whole reason our offense is not working, despite having very creative players like Fortounis, Mantalos, Gianniotas in it , is there exists no transition in the midfield. My belief on this? Skibbe has the "ας κρατησουμε το 0 Priority" so he always fills the midfield with fully defensive and fast moving players. And to be fair, its working, OFFENCE: Mantalos not existent, not at all. Did nothing up front but can't really blame him. Lulic was on that side, and he had to help Toro in his defensive duties( I 'll say more on the rating part.). Mitroglou had some real good chances , like that cross that didnt even realise it could go through, and the tet-a-tet that begovic luckily kept out with his shoulder. Best chance to make sure it goes on was to shoot it that way, it was a good shot, and I liked that he kept his calm and shot so well. Save was even better. Also was ready to receive that cross from Toro with his head with excelent positioning. Guy needs good serving , but when he gets it, u re sure he ll score. Nothing more to say.Fortounis got it with the long shot, Had an exactly same chance with Belarus, boy seems unlucky. Pretty closed from 2 players of Bosnia 24/7 but the other 2 midfielders(Yes im talking abotu Sama/Maniati) didn't take advante from it. What possibly happened? As I previously mentioned, they were only supposed to have defensive duties. If that's what really happened, is Skibbe to blame? Yes. Stafylidis off position, but another player who was playing midfield/offence but was seen lots of time covering for Tzavellas and even helping him. I don't know why Tzavellas took the MVP award and not him. Really proves to be better everytime he plays. I expect him to be in the starting line up against Belgium as well, because we are gonna need someone extra to defend. He and Gianniotas seemed to be the best players who can control high balls in 1 touch. He had a good run which he crossed to Mitroglou but im my humble opinion he should have shot it(even if it was with his right foot). I expect him to get a good signing in 1-2 years, really shows passion with the team, and is a key player of a mediocre bundesliga team at this age. Gianniotas really gives breath to the team. Fast runs, smart no look passes and such. There is lots of room for improvement, but he is better than anyone we ve tried at Right Flank. He is too hessitant to shoot because he is afraid of being called selfish. I hope this changes. GK: He was very very good, Nothing could be done at the goal. Seeing how bad the Cypriot GK is makes it obvious we are lucky to have him. Just lets hope we don't need a penalty shootout, ever? Karnezis :8 Torosidis :7. Why do you hate? He has a guy named Lulic to mark , and that guy is fast as hell, he made him look useless, of course you can't expect him to be as good as he was in previous matches offensively , when we were playing nonamer oppositions. Sokratis: 6 Our worst defender today. Talking about defensive duties only. made a foul for no reason and we conceded from it, failed an offside trap but made up for it. Got more than 4 because he literally kicked Dzeko out of the game by being annoying. This gave us the opportunity to pressure and actually score. Stupid to give that foul, knowing that Bosnians on set pieces are literally beast mode. K. Papadopoulos: 6. Did no real mistake but he was missmatched when marking Dzeko, who was his initial personal opponent. That's why Manolas would be a lot more handy here. At points when he was on Ibisevic, he was fine. Tzavellas: 6,5. He scored, but most of the chances came again from his side, Stafylidis spent half the match helping him. Also scared to go high a lot, probably Skibbe orders. Maniatis 4. Runs a lot, applies pressure to opponents who try to create a chance.Always there when needed in defence, we never were outnumbered in defence because of both Maniatis and Samaris. But, no help in transition, no offensive help to Fortounis who was marked by 2. Maybe Skibbe orders as well. Samaris 4. Looked like he was playing a 3rd Centerback. Poor passes and kept the ball for no reason at points. *Bonus for Samaris-Maniatis combo: Can't really say we saw Pjanic do his usual magic tricks. I didn't really keep an eye on what was happening on the field, Im a guy who keeps looking at the ball, the guys who tape and rewatch the match can tell us. Possibility these 2 were unseen is that their dirty work was to keep Pjanic at bay. Until we rewatch the match we can't tell. If they really did this, they deserve a lot better ranking and a lot less hate. Fortounis: 6 No mistake, no losing the ball on bad spots, has vision but plays very high to utilize it. Was well closed from the opponent mids. Mantalos: 5. Helped torosidis a lot with Lulic. Nothing offensively. Combined well with Toro and Fortounis to make the crossbar chance happen. Gianniotas 6. Pressured the enemy defender but that guy looks buffed as f*ck. 50 kg against 80 can't get you much. Won the crucial free throw that got us the goal, deserves credit. TV presenters said he was not given a couple of fouls. I disagree with them. Stafylidis: 7. The real MVP for me. Running, crossing, defending. Everything, was everywhere. Gonna be a key player for the NT. Slightly overrated because he played out of position, and still made it. Mitroglou: 5,5. Had his chances, didn't execute. He should have delivered at least once. TooLong-Didn'tRead version: We were bad at first half becuase we were afraid to play offensively. We played offensively at 2nd half and I think we dominated it.(alongside bosnian coach helping us). Bosnian offence needed defensive care, and we had what it takes to keep them at bay.Sokratis bad match. Few key chances for us like woodworks and tetatets. Draw deserved in total. Reminds of old Greek NT.

Here's the problem with thisshit version of a 4-2-3-1. if you're gonna play with just four attackers you need: two outstanding wingers, a target man and a number 10. weve got the number 10 in fortounis. But Mitro has the first touch of a garbage truck and can't hold the ball up. Mantalos is another 10 forced out wide. Staf is a left back for F*** sakes. you also need fullbacks who can make forward runs. Toro has lost that part of his game and Tzavellas never had it. Plus defensive mids who know how to retain possession and control a game. Maniatis is a joke. And Samaria has shown no aptitude for game management. But hey, skibbe got the center back pairing right!!

Dear god. Did you not watch the game? Our guys couldn't exchange a second pass. The game plan was find mitroglou. When you have maniatis in the midfield with samaris and the opposition has pjanic, you don't have a leg to stand on. Our defenders are not even that great. Manolas and sokratis are heavily overrated in these forums. But even if we had hummels and bonnuci, without proper midfielders that can retain the ball to relieve pressure, you are always going to struggle. The bosnian team is much , much better and they proved it. The result would've felt like a loss for them and rightly so.

Constantinople*

It was EURO 2012 qualifying, not 2008

extended highlights in greek.

Romanians are by no means Slavic, Romanians has more in common with us than they have with Serbs in any way. Greeks and Romanians has an interrelated history going back thousands of years.

Nice post Thrylos. I too have many Serb friends and acquaintances and it's similar to how you described your situation. Just because there were lots of Serbs (and Greeks and Italians) growing up. I will correct you on one thing though. You said 90% of the world don't even know what Skopje is. I would venture to say it's closer to 99.99%.

Bosnia plays positive football, they are not a bad team, but yesterday Pjanic missed one opportunity that he should have scored, that`s it. We did not allow many other quality scoring chances. Please, for the love of god, do not underestimate the fact that we were missing Manolas. He is a world class CB and, along wityh Sokratis, out best player. His replacement, K Papadopoulos, is not far behind, but would have been playing DM next to Benfica`s Samaris if Manolas was there, which would have made it all that much more difficult for Bosnia to break the line. We were far from perfect, but still drew Bosnia, without our best player. Take away Pjanic and see how comfortable you feel approaching next match...

Hold on. We had no place finishing 6th. There was just too much turmoil going on within the team, we changed 3 managers and the ball did not bounce our way at all. We did not play well by any means, but we were not a 6th place team. A draw was a fair reflection yesterday, yes. Bosnia had its moments, they had a positive scheme, they scored a brilliant free kick that took a lucky bounce, but not taking much more away from that. We hit the bar and then scored a fanatastic goal. Let`s also not forget we were missing Manolas, our best player along with Sokratis, and one of the best CBs alive at the moment. The next meeting should be one for the ages.

http://www.heraldsun.com.au/sport/football/south-melbourne-to-submit-bid-for-aleague-licence-and-seek-inclusion-in-competition-from-next-season/news-story/47d0f45da08a932c2c11cb95a52a9b4e?nk=1bd65e511912884699dda2d844f77412-1479126510 What are the chances?

I havent gone through the pages so apologies if its been mentioned..our goal should have been ruled out..clear as day foul throw amazing we got away with that. As for bosnia they are clearly the superior team but sometimes its their biggest weakness because they overate themselves...they could have killed the clock in injury time but instead kept getting numbers forward pushing for a 2nd..obviously playing riskier passes they kept giving us opportunities to get the ball back and launch some final attacks..good team but also a bit dumb all the same.

Bosnia are a good team..

In many ways, GrkCdn22 is the Tzavella of our forum lol

You obviously haven't been to a Euro or WC to know what I mean. And I have heard MANY Serbs call them Macedonians. Maybe if you looked at the comments way earlier you will see my comments toward the Greek and Serb supporters at the game and my feelings toward that.

Wow he supports Greece maybe go ask him why he refs to the skops as Macedonians if he has so much love for us.....

Wasn't talking about inside the stadiums but outside when fan bases are around each other drinking, if the Polish Argentianians hell even the Nigerians can make an effort to come take photos with us Greeks then surely our so called brothers would also. If Serbs loved us so much why do they call skops Macedonians then? I don't buy into that orthodox brother rubbish, there was a time I did but after going to many events it changed my mind.

I know this mate and have seen it at every major event I have been too and I have always said IF the Greeks could put their club rivalry aside we would be one of the best and most feared fan bases in Europe. In 2012 we got voted best fans at the Euros in Poland, opening game there was 55,000 polish fans and only 2,500 of us and at times we were louder than they were. But us Greeks would rather hate on our own than unite.

Those idiots who took out that banner are a bunch of F***wits. We have suffered genocides so to mock others is pretty dumb. I don't see why we support Serbia so much and don't give me this "orthodox brotherhood" bullshit as it doesn't exist. The next match is going to be a fierce one.

The Bosnians are going to get what's coming, I can't wait till early June!

we can kinda play good attacking balla when our hand is forced eg) vs. ivory coast and romania here's the goalara by mr. tsabouka. was that mr. mykonos with the assist?

2 points in the next 2 games would almost certainly give us 2nd spot. managing our goal difference will also be crucial, we are currently +4 ahead of Bosnia, they have something like 5 players suspended for the Gibraltar game including dzeko so they may struggle to run up the score. It's important that if we do lose against Belgium its as narrow as possible.

This goal might be the goal that will change our campaign. after a dreadful first 35 minutes. The boys showed great spirit. we can beat bosnia away if we prepare ourseleves and show up. as for Belgium I just hope the pirate ship shows up.

the worst player on the pitch was Samaris. the worst passer I dont mid if any of the 2 cbs did any bad passes. They kept a world class offence Lulic, Dzeko , Ibisevic, Pjanic in just one LUCKY goal. Maniatis Samaris combo was terrible today, Terrible, not just bad. We cant really expect much against Belgium so since I saw such poor performance from Maniatis-Samaris today, I wouldnt mind in changing both.

In your face grown up! TZAVELLAS!!!

We were dreadful, played like a bunch of 8 year olds, yet we still had 3-4 very good chances. credit for the goal was a great hit. we went from having our campaign finished to just having our noses in front for the playoff spot, take it and run.

We are a bad, bad side. I should've gone to the beach with my girlfriend. Now she's mad at me

I'd make zeca a Greek if it's to get rid of maniatis

I don't ever see a day where you have a system like in the U.S. (and Australia for that matter) of drafts, spending caps etc. It's too far gone and the big clubs in Europe would object vociferously. I think if it came to it, they would break away and make their own league. Having said that, UEFA has implemented the Financial Fair Play system but it's still a bit of a joke. It's too little too late. There were always big clubs (e.g. Barcelona, Real Madrid, Bayer, Man Utd, Liverpool, Milan, Inter, Juve etc.) but the disparity now is ... just so large it's become ridiculous. This is because of the CL and the huge prize money. It started the snowball effect and has just rolled on. But I don't know what you can really do about it. Maybe UEFA could halve the prizemoney and instead give it clubs directly, even those not competing in Europe. Hmm, now I'm sounding like a commie. You want to know what I think is the best way to stop the massive disparity ? Go back to the old days, maybe tweaked a little. 1) Only allow 5 foreigners in the squad. Back in the day it was 3 but I think that's maybe a bit low. 2) Don't allow a club to have more than "x" number of players in total. This is to stop clubs buying 60 players and loaning them out. If you have a player, he should be in your squad. Otherwise, you need to sell him. The beauty of point 1) above is that it curtails the spending power of all "big" clubs. Yes, they'll still get the best, but they won't get "the rest" who are just a little behind in quality, and these players would be at different clubs. You wouldn't get the concentration and stock piling like you have today. And you'd actually get to see teams in Europe that are composed of players that are local. Now, if you beat Arsenal what did you beat ? An English team ? I don't even know what the heck it means anymore.