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Nations League: Greece vs. Hungary (Groupama Arena, Budapest) - September 11, 2018


Argy

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8 minutes ago, Ellada2004 said:

We were hard done to lose today at the very least we deserved a draw.Again another great first half offensively and moving of the ball, but we are always stuck with 1 goal for our efforts.  Hungary had 3 good scoring opportunities to our 8 or 9. The second goal we conceded was ridiculous, there forward dancing around us with shot after shot coming in and the defence cant clear the ball??  We needed a draw minimum vs a Hungary who have a couple of all say good players and who played in an empty stadium. Now the team gets to play in Greece and they need to beat Finland,  that's what the focus has to be.

 

 

Good points, Barkas did everything he could before the second goal we conceded but our defenders couldnt clear the ball it was embarrassing to watch.

Edited by La Mendel
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For all our possession (62%) we only really looked dangerous at set pieces and when we caught Hungary on the break, which was rare considering how they were content to hardly venture forward. 

When we have to try and build up an attack we struggle, we don't really have any one who  can take on defenders for instance like Samaras in his prime. Mitroglou for me again was a disappointment and so was Fortunis and I thought he'd kill it this game. Pelkas I thought did well and for all the abuse Lazaros is getting on here, at least he gave it his all to try and win the game. 

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I’m tired of hearing Donis this Donis that. He’s nothing special. He’s played in like 8 games and doesn’t even have a goal yet. Maybe that will change. But until it does he is what he is. Another offensive bust. A lot of us try to glorify these guys as being better than they actually are. Mitroglou 60 games. 16 goals. When you have to rely on a guy like that for production, your doomed. Hopefully next year we’re not talking about playing Andorra and Sam Marino in the D division. 

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donis is great as a winger but not potent enough to be a single striker. he's so damn fast and won a few balls pure from his speed.

him and pelkas on the wings will be lethal. fortounis middle mitro up top we're solid. then kourbelis zeca cm

back four pretty ncie too if we have staf sok man bakakis. I like this side. hopefully can all stay healthy.

is it this common to always be msising players? it seems we never have a full powered squad 

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1 hour ago, La Mendel said:

Donis is as useless as Ninis Fetfa Koutsianikoulis Gianniotas only we havent realized this yet I guess.

And subbing in Mitroglou really made the difference. He touched the ball once in the second half. Donis was not the problem and our second half display showed that. 

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15 minutes ago, Argy said:

And subbing in Mitroglou really made the difference. He touched the ball once in the second half. Donis was not the problem and our second half display showed that. 

True but Mitroglou scored a bunch of goals for us tbf. Donis has offered nothing yet but a few nice touches.

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1 hour ago, Chris Tsamados said:

Mitroglou for me again was a disappointment and so was Fortunis and I thought he'd kill it this game. Pelkas I thought did well and for all the abuse Lazaros is getting on here, at least he gave it his all to try and win the game. 

You're gona give Lazaros credit for trying and say Fortounis was disappointing in the same sentence regarding this game?

 

Fortounis was our best by some way today

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38 minutes ago, Soprano76 said:

This NT is a disgrace and anybody who tries to put a positive spin on this performance is lying to themselves, IMO

Very much off the mark, I am not lying to myself when I say I think there is a big over-reaction to this loss and that I feel we can build on this performance and possession domination of the last two games.

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Donis can't be judged on a game where he played out of position, If you want to get the most out of him he needs to play on the wing.. How many goals do you seriously expect these players to have for he NT when we average .5 goals a game?? lets be real guys, How many goals does Laz have for his club team for example? The problem has always been with the NT, Even with Santos we would scrape by with 1-0 wins. The only difference is we would not concede during those times and now we concede more then we use to.. That to me is the main difference..  Like I said before you guys can be optimistic but for me this is an embarrassment as we should not be losing to these teams. If we were playing top rated team like Belgium and lost 2-1 on the road then I wouldn't be that upset and I would try and take the positives but losing to Hungary is an embarrassment and it is a step in the wrong direction... Maybe we just aren't s good as we wont to believe, Maybe we do belong with these group C teams..  Our next game is against Hungary at home and all they have to do is play for the tie and they will have the tie breaker on us if it comes down to that.. 

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Cant blame Donis zero service and he was playing in traffic not his game hes all about speed. The hungarians were smart defended well and shot the ball very good from outside the area. Greece always struggles to play teams that put numbers back due to the fact they dont play small passes but.always look for long passes which were very predictable and easy to intercept. Wouldn't hurt if we ran some drills to test there keeper from range or get some counter attacking movement when they get push up. Toro not playing for oly so not sure why hes guaranteed a spot. Bouchlakis is also very average player lately...

Edited by jason
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@Alphonse 

Possession doesn't mean a thing when Greece is toothless in the final third. I remember when we out-possessed Colombia in the 2014 WC. Did that mean anything? No. 

This team has had a problem for several years now, and that's putting the ball in the back of the net. There is no way to sugarcoat this. 

 

Not to mention, Greece has one of the best CB duos based on talent yet they keep leaking in goal after goal against average to below average teams. 

This squad is a mess.

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boucha seemed decent exept that final pass where we had momentum and could've scored... zeca is better though for sure

lazaros was going down too easy. I'd rather us just fight through things and stay up and try to make a chance rather than get screwed by a ref not calling things and trying to milk the foul. Look at Holebas vs. Spurs. He got clipped and almost fell but regained balance and crossed it for a goal. More than a few of those with Tzavellas/Lazaros.

mitroglou looked more confident in 1st game than 2nd. mitroglou of first game probably would have got a goal or two this game.

pelkas was unreal. winning a header inside our box and then running full sprint upfield with a breakaway. him donis/zeca will be unreal engines for us making the field look like a basketball court.

Sucks we lost but I enjoyed this game and I think we can still take this group. Hungary was playing like we were the better team because we are. They just got the better of us. Like another user said 8 times outta 10 we play like this we would win.

 

Edited by georgelaz
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4 hours ago, La Mendel said:

Donis is as useless as Ninis Fetfa Koutsianikoulis Gianniotas only we havent realized this yet I guess.

Yeah but Lazaros is fantastic. Lazaros was really useless today. No technique and 1 dimensional. Some bad touches sane goes for Torosidis. I'd rather have Donis on the wing. Donis is not useless though. The last 2 nt games he has played he hasn't delivered. But every other time he literally carried the team. In my opinion he is unlucky to have not scored yet for the nt. 

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3 hours ago, Chris Tsamados said:

For all our possession (62%) we only really looked dangerous at set pieces and when we caught Hungary on the break, which was rare considering how they were content to hardly venture forward. 

When we have to try and build up an attack we struggle, we don't really have any one who  can take on defenders for instance like Samaras in his prime. Mitroglou for me again was a disappointment and so was Fortunis and I thought he'd kill it this game. Pelkas I thought did well and for all the abuse Lazaros is getting on here, at least he gave it his all to try and win the game. 

Fortounis was our best player. Mitroglou is Mitroglou. He is slow and doesn't get involved in games consistently. Lazaros tried but was very limited technically and that goes a long way. If your always falling down, and have a bad touch you won't get far in football. You need skill and technique as a winger. Fortounis is the one that tried as he got an assist for Manolas. Pelkas was very iffy today. I like him though and he is better than Mantalos and Bakasetas on the wing. 

I have to say that we do look better and our midfield looked stronger without Tziolis and Samaris. Bouchalakis didn't well but looked better than Tziolis. Tzavellas I don't think will ever play again for the national team. Barkas is a good keeper. Saved us many times. In my opinion after this game this is what should happen. 

- Lazaros and Torosidis need to go to the bench. 

- Tziolis, Tzavellas and Bakasetas need to be dropped completely.

- Barkas should be given another chance. 

- Donis needs to start outwide. 

- Kourbelis and Zeca should be the starting CMs. 

- Galanopoulos and Tsimikas need to be in this team. 

Also I hope Vergos and Manos prove themselves this season as we need competition at ST. 

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I cant blame the Greek players today. They played with heart and attacked alot more than the hungarians. Infact we got the away goal which should have been enough. Want to see how this group plays out especially when we finally get to play at home. If we play with the same energy surely we will belt both hungary and estonia on the return legs. If skibbe panics and decides to slow (tsiolis) the team play then we will go nowhere. Am really looking forward to our nxt match against Finland? Dont worry about our performance, i have seen the ethniki since our Euro win and todays game was a breath of fresh air compared to some other games. The goals we conceded were crackers today. Yes we should have cleared the 2nd one and not let hungary have 20 shots in 20 seconds but that defied logic. Had an element of ass in it. The ref was a touvlo. Lazaros and Fortouni were constantly getting fouled and the hungarians should have got far more yellows than 2 for the match. Disgraceful amateur gypsy, we seem to get these refs to our games but that comes with dropping our ranking i guess. Believe me people we have been alot worse than today. I hate losing more than anyone. Bring Zeca in, start Mitroglou, play Donis for 90 minutes unless he cant finish the match. Siova into the squad. Retsos and Staf hopefully are back from injury and hopefully Samari finds form and starts getting big game time at Benfica. Holebas i know has retired from the NT (Skibbe to blame) but he would be a great addition to the squad. Our 21s won away so hopefully we look a couple of lads from there. At the end of the day we can not afford any more losses in the group.

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1 hour ago, trotsk13 said:

Fortounis was fantastic today. Much better than WC qualifying. Very encouraging. 

Yea Fortounis was ok. Still no one has the spine to go at defenders and keep them on their toes. Our players just feed the ball to the wings and hope for a great cross in. All that does and solidifies the opponents pressure tactics. They are never afraid of being taken on. That, out of all problems, is the most frustrating. 

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Still can’t understand why Skibbe started Tzavellas who struggled only to take him off at HT for Lykogiannis, what a waste of a substitution.  Also he should have started Mitroglou in the first half when we were pressing we had many quality chances and he may have been able to finish one. It’s a very disappointing loss a tie would have been the more fair result now I think we have to get 10 points in the last four matches to top the group.

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2 hours ago, Dean97 said:

Fortounis was our best player. Mitroglou is Mitroglou. He is slow and doesn't get involved in games consistently. Lazaros tried but was very limited technically and that goes a long way. If your always falling down, and have a bad touch you won't get far in football. You need skill and technique as a winger. Fortounis is the one that tried as he got an assist for Manolas. Pelkas was very iffy today. I like him though and he is better than Mantalos and Bakasetas on the wing. 

I have to say that we do look better and our midfield looked stronger without Tziolis and Samaris. Bouchalakis didn't well but looked better than Tziolis. Tzavellas I don't think will ever play again for the national team. Barkas is a good keeper. Saved us many times. In my opinion after this game this is what should happen. 

- Lazaros and Torosidis need to go to the bench. 

- Tziolis, Tzavellas and Bakasetas need to be dropped completely.

- Barkas should be given another chance. 

- Donis needs to start outwide. 

- Kourbelis and Zeca should be the starting CMs. 

- Galanopoulos and Tsimikas need to be in this team. 

Also I hope Vergos and Manos prove themselves this season as we need competition at ST. 

I totally agree with your 2nd point.

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3 hours ago, Soprano76 said:

@Alphonse 

Possession doesn't mean a thing when Greece is toothless in the final third. I remember when we out-possessed Colombia in the 2014 WC. Did that mean anything? No. 

This team has had a problem for several years now, and that's putting the ball in the back of the net. There is no way to sugarcoat this. 

 

Not to mention, Greece has one of the best CB duos based on talent yet they keep leaking in goal after goal against average to below average teams. 

This squad is a mess.

Scoring goals has been an issue post 2004 ironically enough. For me the possession I speak to is a more direct and fluent possession than what we saw the last two years, I am not just talking about possession in general. We didnt get the goal we wanted but I think this squad is in no way a mess, you guys are over-reacting, I dunno if you thought Greece was that much better than what we are but this has nothing to do with sugar coating either.

Our defense has been poor for some time now, even with two WC CB's... but we're playing Torosidis and Tzavellas there... Tzavellas got caught out on both goals, especially the first, that's a problem, bloody two new midfielders that allowed us to dictate play and create chances when only last campaign for example, Estonia dictated play against us at their home ground. 

I wonder how people react if Mitroglou scored the sitter at the end?:money-303591:

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