Gate7IntlPodcast

We disagree with the majority of this statement. Before his injury, Galanopoulos was the only Greek midfielder with the ability to play in the 8 role. He's certainly not the same player as Kourbelis, as he has a much larger propensity to get forward and has a larger volume of through balls, downfield longballs, and overall vision. It doesn't take much for a player to be more technical than Zeca, his value is in his work rate. We've seen Mantalos played in a deeper role both for Aek and the National team, it's not great. He's much more effective further up the pitch. There's a reason why he's the Super league assist leader and also leads the Super League in "Major scoring opportunities created/Smart passes", both in volume and on a per 90 min. Although we would agree that Fortounis may be a better CAM, as he has better dribbling ability, but Mantalos is also a solid CAM as well. The dual CAM midfield we used with Fortounis/Bakasetas with a lone DM was very interesting and could be the recipe for success for us against smaller sides and we would be better off than forcing yet another player out of position.

There is plenty to be upset with tactic wise with the coach. We will be breaking down the tactics of JVS tomorrow in our episode with Antoni from Hellas Football. We can't blame JVS for the sitters that were missed by the players, but we can blame him for player choice and scheme given the game script that unfolded. We will be presenting the relevant player data for this as well.

PAME BOYS!!! WE'RE PUMPED!! We continue to hear that things are going to get weird with the lineup, Bakasetas false 9, etc. For the sake of the ethniki, let's at least hope Fortounis is on the field. We posted an interesting stat about the ethniki's shot creation. When Fortounis is in the lineup, the Ethniki converts almost 40% of its positional attacks into shots. When he's not on the field, the Ethniki only converts 21.9% of positional attacks into shots. Also, if you have facebook, instagram, or twitter, tag @gate7intl while wearing your jersey and we'll share it to our story!

A lot of really good points here! Bouchalakis is and has always been a confidence player. He had 2 attempted smart passes to split the defensive lines that were unsuccessful and to our surprise(after viewing the match data) did substantial work on the defensive side of the ball. However, he is not and will never be a real deep lying playmaker. He lost the ball in possession 9 times, which led the ethniki last night. Unfortunately, it's not as if we get much more out of Kourbelis either. This national team is missing the likes of a healthy and in form Galanopoulos. Pavlidis should never have been used in this game. This is something that frustrates us to no end with JVS. Game script seems to elude him. In a more open match, Pavlidis is probably the better hold up player. But in a game where the team you're playing is packing the box and playing ultra defensive, Pavlidis is useless(as we saw yesterday). He was only successful in 29% of all on field actions. Abysmal. Giakoumakis should have been the starter here. As for Masouras vs. Tzolis, obviously we'd all prefer to see Tzolis as he has waaaaaay more potential. Masouras works well with Tsimikas and we'd rather see a real winger playing left wing instead of Fortounis out of position who ends up drifting central most of the time anyway. This then can leave our LB stranded in certain scenarios. All in all, we saw some good things and some bad. Let's hope for the best against Slovenia!

This is curious... The only news we can remember about the National Team and Karaiskaiki was when Grammenos made the statement that the Ethniki needed to "Move On" from Karaiskaiki. Nothing we have read ever indicated that Olympiacos didn't want the national team to use the stadium. The claim was that the venue made it so that other ethniki fans could not enjoy watching the national team.

In regards to the National Team, Vrousai is with the U21. If your question is more general about what's going on with him, it's something that we have lamented for weeks. He has been completely mishandled by the club and in our opinion has not been given a fair shake. He rides the bench while Lazar Randjelovic continues to put uninspiring performances on the field. He wanted to go back to the Netherlands on loan again or on a permanent move but the club announced he was to be a core part of the team. The saga with Mario is very frustrating.

Thank you for the kind words! We will certainly be lurking here and doing our part to bring together more Greeks that love soccer. We also are looking to engage in discussion with our access to next-gen player analytics! As we do on social media and Reddit, feel free to ask any questions that our data can explain or if there's specific data points you are looking at! Let's hope the Ethniki has another great performance on Sunday!

Hello Everyone! We couldn't believe our ears when we heard there was an active Greek soccer community! Glad to see the majority were as positive about yesterday's performance as we are. Now we just need to cross our fingers and hope JVS continues with the great showing we saw and not reverting to some of the miserable lineups with players out of position we saw in the past. Also thought it would be worth mentioning that since the Covid restart, Greece has maintained the highest match tempo it has EVER had since game data has been available. Greece is averaging 17.83 passes per minute of pure ball possession. We certainly are playing much more free flowing!