Greece Vs Romania (Qualifying Play-Off Matches)

[Lazarus]

Greece coach Fernando Santos has named a 24-man squad for the decisive 2014 FIFA World Cup Brazil? qualifying play-off matches against Romania on 15 and 19 November.

 

Goalkeepers: Michalis Sifakis (Atromitos), Orestis Karnezis (Granada/ESP), Stefanos Kapino (Panathinaikos)

 

Defenders: Vasilis Torosidis (Roma/ITA), Loukas Vyntra (Levante/ESP), Sokratis Papastathopoulos (Borussia Dortmund/GER), Kostas Manolas, Jose Holebas, Dimitris Siovas (all Olympiakos), Giorgos Tzavellas (PAOK)

 

Midfielders: Kostas Katsouranis, Alexandros Tziolis (both PAOK), Panayiotis Tachtsidis (Catania/ITA), Panagiotis Kone (Bologna/ITA), Giannis Maniatis, Andreas Samaris (both Olympiakos), Giorgos Karagounis (Fulham/ENG), Sotiris Ninis (PAOK), Kostas Fortounis (FC Kaiserslautern/GER)

 

Forwards: Kostas Mitroglou (Olympiakos), Fanis Gekas (Konyaspor/TUR), Lazaros Christodoulopoulos (Bologna/ITA), Dimitris Salpingidis (PAOK), Giorgos Samaras (Celtic/SCO)

[mangas21]

is papadopoulos hurt? 

 

i really hope we dont go in there respecting this team too much...we REALLY need to go in there and immediately let them know who's boss.....but, we won't...we will sit back, sit back, play tight, defend as if we were playing argentina or germany....

 

very important not to allow away goals....i think that's the plan...they will be happy not to allow Romania to score, even if it mean a draw...at least then every goal scored in romania by us counts as two...

 

very interesting

Edited November 8, 2013 by mangas21

[Lazarus]

All I see is a team that's getting older and older. Instead of inviting new talent and setting the foundations for a nice run on the world scene in Brazil, we're keeping players that can barely drag their feet. I guess Santos is hoping to score about one goal in the two games and not allow any.

 

I was the one thinking that Greece was a boring team under Rehhagel. Little did I know that there was room for an even more boring team under Santos.

[mangas21]

laz i kinda disagree....the only older guys are kats and karagouni....

 

mitro/samaras/siovas/toro/holebas/fourtounis/ papa/ etc they arent old....

 

the PROBLEM is that midfiled is the most critical position - especially when transitioning the game form off to def and vice versa - if the mids cant go box to box to support the forwards then you have the makings of a team that appears slow....

 

kats/kara are positional players at this pint BUT in tight games - which these two are - one mistake out of position etc, could be deadly...

 

We have never played with flair or gusto / we have always been defensive and counter....as far as i can remember thats the soccer mentality....so expecting anything different is really misguided....

 

for these games with the way the goals totls work, etc etc i think kats is needed in there....if u go back and look at alot of the reent goas we scored Kats was in the midddle either with a crafty pass or build up of sorts......

 

i think relying on samaras by himself o make things happen is a mistake....i would put fourtounis/samars and then tsiolis/kats slightly behind them with papa/pap/toros/siovas  wit mitroglou and salpi up front ....at least then you have the ability to lend support to the strikers.....or say mitro samaras behind him fourtoui/tsiolis with kats behind them and the four defenders.....

 

u need to support the Offense with some mids pushing up....we have been saying this same thing for 10 years.....they just dont play like that.....but i know they can.. isaw the friendly against ecuador in nj and they played very offensive, but kara and kats sat down for the entire foist half and much of the second......

[Lazarus]

In the event that Greece makes it to Brazil, this will be the age of the players listed above:
Michalis Sifakis 29, Orestis Karnezis 29, Stefanos Kapino 20, Vasilis Torosidis 29, Loukas Vyntra 33, Sokratis Papastathopoulos 26, Kostas Manolas 23, Jos? Holebas 30, Dimitris Siovas 25, Giorgos Tzavellas 26, Kostas Katsouranis 35, Alexandros Tziolis 29, Panagiotis Tachtsidis 23, Panagiotis Kone 27, Giannis Maniatis 26, Andreas Samaris 25, Giorgos Karagounis 37, Sotiris Ninis 24, Kostas Fortounis 21, Kostas Mitroglou 26, Fanis Gekas 34, Lazaros Christodoulopoulos 27, Dimitris Salpingidis 32, Georgios Samaras 29

That averages to 27.7. I wouldn't consider it a young team, but then again sort of acceptable (Spain had an average of 25.9 when they won the World Cup, 26.78 for Euro 2012). When was the last time anybody under 25 played for this team? Not just being on the bench. Who do they expect to do the running on the field? Who are they going to win with? Some of the players will be joining the AARP any time now.

 

We have never played with flair or gusto / we have always been defensive and counter....as far as i can remember thats the soccer mentality

 

Those of us old enough to remember, do have fond memories of skillful players that played with finesse. No international distinctions, but no game was boring.

[js1000]

couple of points here, fetfatzidis has done really well for genoa and is not involved in the squad, he should have been in ahead of lazaros who's done nothing, and why is samaris included?? because he played a couple of champions league games for oly?? second point is 12 months ago under santos we were playing really good attacking football we were brilliant against lithuania and completely dominated bosnia in athens, the bosnians were celebrating at the end of the match having got away with a 0-0, but since then we have reverted back to playing horrible football and santos' team selections have been bizarre.

[mangas21]

laz, 27 average is fine with me...what do expect? an average age of 21? you can forget that.....its NEVER been the MO of the national team....but even though the average is 27, thats not as relevant as the AGE of KEY players.....kats & kara, two guys who drive the team dont have the legs to play box to box....when they play deep in the oppostition zone, we get much better chances and we "look" more offensive....

 

and regarding your comment "no game was boring" I say ----how many tournaments did we qualify for playing "non boring:"?  i'll tell you ---ZERO..........i prefer to WIN.........Italy has been playing catanachio for decades...i dont hear anyone belly aching about that....

 

the problem is strategy.....we play deep and look to counter...its the mentality that has shown success since early 2000, so they stay with it...

 

regarding lithuania, the only reason we looked more offensive is because we wre not afraid of the other teams offenseive capability...so we pushed up further and, just form shear numbers, we had more plaayers in their offensive zone....

 

i dont think you can say replacing one or two aging players at midfield will result in a more offensive look....if we dont push up and play offensive minded, then it does not matter who is on the field....

 

kats is a scapegoat, but if you watch him onm a regular basis ihe is in the middle of alot of goals we score.....mind u, i am not a fan of him one way or the other, im just stating facts....i dont think he is the problem....its the strategy...

 

js, i agree on fet....also santos does do some bizzare things...agreed...

[Lazarus]

.i prefer to WIN.........

...Which raises the philosophical question: Is the purpose of the game to provide entertainment, or is it simply to win at all costs?

Personally, I believe both have to be in place for the sport to fulfill it's purpose.  If one leaves out any one of those elements, then the sport delivery has a void somwehere. Was the Dutch team of Johan Cruyff and Total Football a failure? Best darn football ever played on a field if you ask me. But yet, no trophies. Contrast that with Greece - a Euro 2004 trophy and a spectacle that to date puts audiences to sleep. Personally, I'd rather have a distinction like that of Johan Cruyff and Johan Neeskens.

 

Anyway, I'll stick to the topic from now on... Greece vs Romania

[mangas21]

laz, very eloquently said....and u r on topic...(for the most part)

 

but, in total disagreement..sorry....the point is to win. why bother playing? "peksame kala all xasame" werent you sick of hearing that? "no u didnt play well, you LOST".......

 

and, greece win 2004 was a stroke of tactical/coaching/execution genius..i though it was a beautiful display of teamwork, guts, opportunistic conversion AND DEFENSE - which by the way is much harder to play well consistently..there is beauty in a defensive style if u care to see it...of course we look like inept , weak and non creative on offense often. I'll grant you that, but its the way we play. (for now) if we need a goal we seem to be able to get it...the margin of error is small as we've said many times, but its just how they play, to the level of their competition. 

 

against romania we wont all of a sudden become brazil or argentina...we dont have the players to do that. can push the mids up to help the forwards. yes...will we? i doubt it...tactically they should put offesnsive pressure on romanina right away....but we won't...it always takes us 20 minutes to wake up...so we play to our strengths and if that means 1-0 in greece and 0-0 in romania then ill take it, no matter how much coffee i need to drink to stay awake as i book my ticket to brazil...

Edited November 10, 2013 by mangas21

[Omonoia9]

EPO has decided to have the home match at Stadio Giorgos Karaiskaki in Piraeus once again. I thought they might have chosen to have it in Athens at OAKA to get potentially more than the 34,000 or so Karaiskaki holds, but ok. I know last time against Ukraine we drew in Athens, and then won the return leg, but I really think if we don't win at home this time, we'll fall short.

[mangas21]

WILL BE SURPRISED IF WE DONT ADVANCE...WE HAVE THE EXPERIENCE IN TIGHT, MEANINGFUL GAMES....AND IF WE PUT PRESSURE ON THEM EARLY EVEN BETTER..(UNLIKE GERMANY, SOUTH KOREA, SWEDEN, ETC ETC ETC ) WHERE SIT BACK AND ABSORB OFFENSIVE PRESSURE...

 

CANT ALLOW THESE NEWBIES TO GET INTO A RHYTHM. THAT WOULD BE A BAD TACTICAL DECISION. NEED TO SHOW THEM WHO'S BOSS EARLY AND OFTEN....CAN NOT GIVE THEM TOO MUCH RESPECT....JUST ENOUGH TO GET THEM INTO BED, THEN TREAT THEM LIKE A RENTED MULE......

Edited November 13, 2013 by mangas21

[Omonoia9]

Other thread not working, so I started one just for this match. Leg 1, Greece at home to Romania at Stadio Giorgos Karaiskaki in Piraeus.

[gcp]

So far so good, 3-1 and the pressure is on....I am not watching but am listening to the radio. Can you recommend a link that televises the game?

[Lazarus]

Game is over by now - but you can see Tuesday's game (in the US) at espn3.com

[Lazarus]

Game's over 3-1. Better performance (than other times) by the Greek team. Not impressed by Mitroglou - even though he did seem to do what he was there for - score goals (the second goal went off the Romanian player's head, changing trajectory and ending up in the net). I don't understand why a player with zero (0) football skills - Samaras - is on the national team. Bad ball control, bad dribble, bad shot... In other words

[Omonoia9]

Greece 3-1 Romania  FT

 

 

:gr:  :gr:  :gr: 

[Omonoia9]

Can you make sure this thing works during the next game?

[mangas21]

 " Not impressed by Mitroglou - even though he did seem to do what he was there for - score goals "  ----------- huh? so i guess Liverpool, Chelsea and the other big German team that want him aren't that impressed either even though he sores goals.....dood what are you talking about? 

 

 

 I don't understand why a player with zero (0) football skills - Samaras - is on the national team. Bad ball control, bad dribble, bad shot... In other words

Edited November 15, 2013 by mangas21

[js1000]

decent performance for a change, we really deserved a 4th goal and gekas was unlucky to have his late goal ruled out. papastathopoulos was outstanding tonight but siovas along side him looked like a bit of a donkey i would have preferred manolas instead, samaras who is usually good in these big games was way below par but he had a big hand in salpi's goal and managed to get a romanian booked early on and tziolis who i probably wouldn't have picked was superb today, mitroglou took his goals well and maybe could have had a third when stretching late on. i just hope the disallowed goal and romania's away goal from a soft free kick - needlessly given away by torosidis - doesn't come back to bite us on tuesday. 

[mangas21]

js - we outclassed romania....i did not know they were so weak, especially in defense...we can exploit it very easily if we push up like we did today...

 

guys like tsiolis for instance are so important but what they do is not obvious...kats is the same way...i assume maniatis is that way as well because he does not overtly impress me with anything i cant point to....but so much of soccer is subtle and not obvious...

 

i wonder why fourtouni is not in....

 

i wrote prior to the game that i would be surprised if we did not go through...and, barring some disaster, we are going to brazil

[Lazarus]

mangas21, on 15 Nov 2013 - 17:07, said:

sorry to be so critical, but these comments are just plain silly.....

Listen. I don't give a flying canolli what you think about my comments. Nothing personnal, but an anonymous guy that goes by the name 'mangas21' is not somebody I care about. You have your opinions on subjects, I have mine. I never asked you to agree with them. State your opinion and leave the frosting off. You don't have to condescendingly address my comments or try putting them down in order to seemingly elevate your opinion in the public eye. I don't play this game. You got something to say? State your opinion - end it there. The rest is baloney and I'm not really in a mood or interested to put up with it.

When it comes to soccer, I've seen enough good players and teams in my life to be able to spot mediocrity. Some people have never seen top quality. As a consequence they think mediocrity is the highest possible level somebody can achieve and that players like Samaras and Mitroglou are top notch.

Usually that is the end of the conversation for me. This is the case here.

Omonoia9 said:

Can you make sure this thing works during the next game?

What the f...? You know, s%$#! happens sometimes. We do the best to keep things running. That's about all we can do.

[mangas21]

typical over sensitivity...for a guy who isnt in the mood you sure wrote alot...

 

look, i never meant to insult you personally, so if I did it was not my intention...

 

this is a forum. if we are all gonna kiss each other asses, whats the point...disagreement is much more instructive as far as i am concerned. 

 

bottm line i thought the comments were silly. never said u were silly, or u dont know soccer or anything directed at you, nothing..

 

also i never said these guys were quality. but u said samaras has zero skills which is silly (look at just this game again and see how much he was involved in the goals) and mitroglou who did not impress u but scored his goals...make no sense to me.

 

instead of focusing on the fact that we came out a bit aggressive for once and that tactic made a HUGE difference (regardless of the gerusia) who make the comments you did...

 

sorry man, but they were silly.....if i say something you think is silly, tell me  - straight up....i will defend my position, and u either dig in or u see my side as another perspective... thats what forums and lively discussion is all about...

 

we all bleed blue and white....so please, dont be so sensitive....