Giorgos Samaras ‒ (retired)

[Dikefale11]

^I think you mean WC 2014 not 2010.

[MykinesFC]

^^ I meant 2010. Although the result wasn't extraordinary: qualifying, scoring and winning a game at that level were a big deal after the disappointment of 2008.

[La Mendel]

^^ Sounds like NT captain material for Anastasiadis.. 

 

Well it sounds good. He would be a good captain. Torosidis and Papastathopoulos could be also a great choice.

[Akritis_1944]

He was clearly being sarcastic! I hope we never have to put up with Anastasiadis nor Samaras as captain.

[La Mendel]

He was clearly being sarcastic! I hope we never have to put up with Anastasiadis nor Samaras as captain.

 

Ok, thanks. I didnt detect the irony. Was glad, thought a bit of good news after the "Bomba Ranieri" and other unpleasant surprises (cf. Samaras, Salpingidis omitted by Markarian, lot of injured players, the whole Ranieri era etc. etc.).

[Akritis_1944]

I must be missing something about the tone of your posts. Surely you're a parody. I don't think anyone would be seriously posting the stuff you do.

[Doxa]

Some Journalist from sport24.gr wrote on Twitter yesterday that he indeed had offers from MLS, Russia and some other clubs and a club from Brazil was serious but offered him way less money. Why the hell did he chose Sampdoria? Proberly the most troubled club of all? Hs choices are a mystery to me.

Edited August 7, 2015 by Doxa

[La Mendel]

I must be missing something about the tone of your posts. Surely you're a parody. I don't think anyone would be seriously posting the stuff you do.

 

So you dont think the lot of injuries or the Ranieri era were unpleasant surprises?

[tasos13]

Samaras is a waste of everyone's time.

Gekas for NT captain

[AEK86]

This thread is embarrassing. Gay jokes and petty insults? Here I thought we'd left that crap behind on the old forum...

[MykinesFC]

I really want this topic to get past this page for reasons which are obvious and pictoral . Any news on potential clubs? I'm hoping on PAOK then everyone's Salpi/Sammy love/hate can be focussed on one club.

[pash]

I definitely don't want him at PAOK. Klaus is much better than him, and his lethargic style would make him a non starter here (literally)

[Nikitas]

so whats the deal with him? sampdoria took back cassano so that story is over. didnt found any latest news on him.

[MykinesFC]

Just after the Sampdoria deal went sour the Greek press mentioned other vague offers (MLS, Russia, Savvidis' continued interest at PAOK.) It's been silent for a few days now. The failed medical seems to have cooled whatever interest there may have been. Right now I think he'd be fortunate if anyone in Europe took a chance on him as he clearly won't be able to contribute right away.

[Akritis_1944]

I heard he's working in a suburban 7/11 in Melbourne. Might pick up a taxi shift on weekends too.

[MykinesFC]

I figure if Nikitas (who seems to have the best news gathering methods here) hasn't heard anything, then that 7/11 is looking as likely as anything else!

[Lefkaditis]

I heard he's working in a suburban 7/11 in Melbourne. Might pick up a taxi shift on weekends too.

What rubbish!

 

I heard he was working at a car wash in Dandenong. Get your facts straight!

[Akritis_1944]

He may have moved on. I heard it on the weekend at the Oakleigh kafeneio.

[pash]

Metrio?

[Lefkaditis]

A mate said he'd seen him working at his grandfather's fish & chip shop in South Melbourne.

 

Apparently his dad Yiannis also worked there decades ago before they emigrated to Greece. Could be coming to the A-League?

[Lefkaditis]

I don't know if it's the same grandfather but I read that his grandfather died last year (sometime after the World Cup) and it really got to him and set him back. Apparently they were very close and would talk a lot, even after his games.

You're absolutely right and I forgot about that........sorry, poor comment in light of this

[La Mendel]

Regardless, he was not physically ready in August or September and I'm pretty pissed off that he let Gekkas take his penalty vs CR. 

 

 

I think he would have taken the last penalty.

[La Mendel]

tantra GrkCdn is at the moment one of the sound people here. Why should he learn from aek66 who is a hopeless Rehhagel/Santos/Karagounis/Katsouranis hater. (There are many on the forum, unfortunately.)

[La Mendel]

Notwithstanding, we should have beaten the FI, Finland, Northern Ireland. Poor fitness & late season start cant explain the disaster that happened during and after Ranieris reign. That applies to the unexperienced new key players too. An idiotic coach is responsible for that, first of all.

Certainly there are many problems in Greek football. That said, however, with a proper strategy (read proper coach) + players we should have earn one of the top 2 spots in the qualifying group.

Yes, Fetfatzidis and Ninis didnt prove so far that they had outstanding talent. It is farcical however that any skilful Greek players should be hailed as a Messi/Ronaldo etc. Evidently they never were such good.

Attackers. Karelis is one of the few younger players who at least showed a spark of talent in the past months. Yet Samaras is only 30, so he can play for Greece for 3-4 years (I would welcome such an event). Salpingidis could be used as a super sub or so.

Midfielders. The main problem is that we should do well without any quality midfielders (for the moment). Guys like Karagounis, Zagorakis and Basinas are nowhere to be found now. Santos played 35-y-o Katsouranis because the other options STANK. Lazaros, Ninis, Tachtsidis, Fetfatzidis etc. are more or less glittering mediocrities. The former generation (Kara/Kats/Zagorakis/Tsiartas/Basinas/Giannakopoulos) were IMO better players who were underestimated in the world (especially Karagounis). Our midfielder pool is very limited. I would accept Maniatis and Tziolis over players like Tachtsidis, Lazaros etc. etc. At least Maniatis can fight even if he in other respects isnt outstanding. That puts him ahead practically all of our available midfielders. The others are average players, even if some of them belong to the shiny type (Tziolis clearly doesnt but he can do more dirty work).

Because of this, and other reasons, we should return to our former system and concentrate on the defense. Central defenders are our strongest asset, we should capitalize this advantage and not dream about an attacking team dominating the field, perhaps playing tiki-taka which is an impossibility.

[La Mendel]

Maniatis has a heart and plays with passion. He is a mentally strong player and can support our defenders. It isnt by accident Santos nearly always played him.

As for the others, Kyriakos Papadopoulos could be used as a defensive midfielder (it would be wasteful to have such a good player on the bench because we have other outstanding central defenders too), unfortunately he is injury prone. Samaris could develop at Benfica, two or three years he can gain international experience (European cups), possibly he can be ultimately a good player. Then we could have a Maniatis-Papadopoulos-Samaris midfield, but this is very far away now, I hope they will get along, but it is far from sure. For the moment, we have Maniatis who plays with heart&guts (that lifts him above most of our midfielders), some promising players and a lot of guys who are in the long run average footballers, technically gifted wingers who doesnt seem to be mentally strong and fail at great tournaments (Ninis, Fetfatzidis), glistening mediocrities in the Serie A like Tachtsidis or Christodoulopoulos, and not very talented defensive minded players like Tziolis and (perhaps) Petsos. I cant see how could we do without Maniatis now.

Edited August 16, 2015 by La Mendel