Friendly: Belgium - GREECE

[NYC_Olympiakos]

lets all be honest the biggest problem with our NT is our best players or starters lack enough playing time at there club level teams

Look at some of our good players Basinas No Club at the moment

Kygiakos No club at the moment

Goumas and Kastouranis Injured understandable

Dellas recovering from injury but not Club

Karagounis who is probably along side with Stelios our best players

Karagounis can't even reach the bench for Inter

i mean u see a lot of NT coaches threaten a players starting position when they don't play regularly thus it gives a player an incentive to find another club

not the case for our NT

and hearing that Denmark spanked England 4-1 ( know its a friendly but still) we are in deep trouble

hell were in enough trouble playing against KAZ

we can't score

[greeksoccerfanatic]

A few simple words paidia. OUR ETHNIKI BLOWS GOATS. What Champions of Europe re filoi. This you call a team!? Six games with no goals and counting. No flair to our offense, and no creativity in the midfield, and the defense reminded of the Ethniki of five years ago. And Otto states that Dellas and Katsouranis were missing, so what. I am tired of this mentality and excuses. We simply cannot score. Bring on Xoutos I say and then we'll see a difference. Bring on Zikos, and possibly Samaras, because Kazakhstan is approaching quickly, and by what I saw today a seventh game with no goals and a Kazakhstan win is not a far off bet. Ntroph to the Champions of Europe, that put Greek football, and Greeks everywhere on the highest pedistill last summer in Portugal. We are slowly but surely proving the critics who said we won Euro by a fluke, to be absolutely right. I am just disgusted. :tdown:

[loup]

I agree with a lot of what was said - Lybe should be on this team and Alexopoulos looked pretty confident back there

I would say Lybe should be ahead in the rotation of Gekas Paps Amantidis Lakis and even maybe Vryszas

Kyrgiakos is a spaz as a central defender - reminds me of Dabizas - and we need Dellas back and healthy big time (if not then Goumas)

Good point about the players without clubs - also the A Ethniki has not begun - and you could tell they were rusty

We should remember the reality of our group - we will beat Kaz on the road - even if we paly like crap they are terrible - and we will win our home game against Georgia - so that means one game matters and that is vs Denmark -

that's it -we win and I'm sure we will advance

(I don't think tha Turkey can beat both Ukr and Den - which they will need to do if we win)

Even if we tie - we will likey go through as long as Turkey doesn't win 2 of its last 3 - we will then win a tie breaker with the Danes

I think we will do it :gr: :gr: :gr:

Zito

[loup]

One more thing that is driving me nuts -

I am not a giant Basinas fan - but he should be taking all the free kicks and corners Karagounis hits his kicks too flat and Stelio floats his - that is obvious to me

[Euphoria]

Turkey lost 3-1 to Bulgaria which is good.

[Korisos]

turkey losing 3-1

denmark 4-1

we should take these results w/ a grain of salt cos a lot of stuff can happen b/t now and september and october, but what i can say for sure based on these last 6 performances, if you include the lack of creativity from midfield (which i have been saying since albania 2-0), poor set pieces, poor defence etc. etc. in short, the reality is, we need a miracle to get 2nd place.

[chameleon65]

Oh what a tough road ahead and honestly for me it doesn't look good for us in Denmark even though we might beat Kaza and Georgia. I'll give my support till the end. I'm not going to get into who requires to play and who shouldnt, yada yada...the team has for whatever reasons lost its flame and one man I don't blame for this is Otto. He's done the ultimate task.

Maybe the NT have been cursed..Bring a Papa or voodoo to cleanse the team ;)

My feeling is that the Danes have built and are increasing momentum and they will pass us and Turkey and qualify. They're looking stronger.

For us and turkey it will be a toss up for 3rd place.

This might sound I'm giving up on our ethniki but no matter happens I'm going to be proud of them and what they've accomplished.

Onward And Forward They Go :gr:

[billydagreek]

Guys, I honestly cant blame rehagell, and someone mentioned we should give another coach a chance....we have given many coaches chances over the years and one after the other blew balls....oto put together a team that could play anc could win....as for today lets not forget it was a friendly....yeah we didnt score but it doesnt count and i dont care.....i think otto has seen enough to prepare us for the kaza game 1-0 greece ....I dont want to make excuses but we have a few injuries, players arent quite ready yet, and honestly they dont seem to care(the players that is) it seems they got somewhat of an ego last year and they all took it kind of easy.....anyway that s my two cents

[NYC_Olympiakos]

guys take it out of your heads that we will just beat KAZ 1-0

fact is we just suck right now

we can't look ahead of Kaz

we can't afford too

but i do agree that Basinas should be taking most of the FK's but these dayz nobody can't do anything right for the Ethiniki

[Cerigo]

I hope I am wrong but after Denmark v England result I feel a 5-0 thrashing coming up when we play Denmark.

[drakos13]

Karagounis who is probably along side with Stelios our best players

Karagounis can't even reach the bench for Inter

that actually isnt true anymore last year he was always on the bench and started some games and did come on as a sub....

:LOL: greeksoccerfanatic you think a crap Xoutos will change the team???

:LOL: :LOL: :LOL: :LOL:

the strikers we had played great as good as they could--- there was no help or service from midfield like u said no creativity...strikers in order to score need help from midfield...the positioning and movement was there Vryzas and Charisteas were sharp..but with the midfield doing nothing of course they cant score....the only addition need to be made to strikers is drop Salpi in favor of Pap..he is ideal in that open 433 we were playing second half...

as for set peices----basinas's set peices are crap too! but still better than giannako-karagkounis with the most awful corners in the world...

as for denmark---theyve always been a fantastic team...we cant beat them in denmark...we should go for the goal early then play with 6-3-1 and kick the ball out of the stadium to waste time..

[aek21]

We're just unlucky, no need to panic. Houtos is garbage. And WE WILL MAKE IT TO THE WORLD CUP. I think the players have lost the ability to believe that they can still overtake the world. At Euro they were a completely different team, motivated and almost invinsible like no one could beat us. I think the players have fallen under the pressure to succeed, which I don't blame them. You could see when they played Brazil, right after losing to Ukraine which was a huge blow. Brazil just outclassed us, all of their goals were almost impossible there was no stopping them. The only thing that needs to be changed is their mentallity, they have the potential. Once Dellas is back, Greece will be back, I'm 100% of it.

[REDmagic]

There is NO need to panic guys :nono: Yes we are struggling but after we beat Kazakstan and Denmark beats Turkey we will get revenge against the Danes from 1997 :P and get 2nd place :nw:

The players also need match time and also a bit of luck would be nice (e.g Ukraine 0-1) :angry:

:gr: :gr: H ELLADA POTE DEN PETHENEI :gr: :gr:

[drakos13]

We're just unlucky, no need to panic. Houtos is garbage. And WE WILL MAKE IT TO THE WORLD CUP. I think the players have lost the ability to believe that they can still overtake the world. At Euro they were a completely different team, motivated and almost invinsible like no one could beat us. I think the players have fallen under the pressure to succeed, which I don't blame them. You could see when they played Brazil, right after losing to Ukraine which was a huge blow. Brazil just outclassed us, all of their goals were almost impossible there was no stopping them. The only thing that needs to be changed is their mentallity, they have the potential. Once Dellas is back, Greece will be back, I'm 100% of it.

this again people acting like it was a privelige to lose 3-0 to brazil......

we were pathetic in that game. absolutly horrendous. no defense, no passing no offense no defense anything. it wasnt brazil being great. brazil went on to lose to mexico and tie japan in that same form...

[Morphi]

I hope I am wrong but after Denmark v England result I feel a 5-0 thrashing coming up when we play Denmark.

I saw the whole game between Danmark & England... Denmark won simply because Becks and his mates didn't give a f** about this game. You can also add strange choices from SGE such as James in goals for the second half. he simply offered 4 goals to his opponents...

[OFI-mtl]

Seitaridis-----good defensive skils, but just couldnt cut it on the attacking part....no good service

Were we watching the same game, I thought Giourkas was hesitant to take on defenders but 3 of his crosses resulted in scoring opputunities.

The main problem I see is a team that has no motion no creativity ...seems that everyone is standing still... Basinas even Zagorakis on the Offensive look like statues out there.

How is it that an entire country can only develop one LEFT BACK... after Fyssas we have nothing leftfooted... How Bout Lagos, Grammozis?

ANY PLAYER WHO IS NOT WITH A CLUB RIGHT KNOW CANNOT BE IN THE ENDEKADA! Kyriakos and Basinas look like guys who have not trained..finding a club know will not help us... If Dellas Goumas are not fit then the SPOT should go to Tavlaridis or Alexopoulos(Hold your breath boys). Katsouranis has earned the starting spot over basinas if he is not fit then Kafes should get the start.

Strikers have to score Vryzas cannot go a full 90 and be affective, Charisteas couldnot hit water if he fell off a boat, he has fallin to 4th on AJAX depth chart.

Time to give Paps and Gekkas or Amanatidis the start! Lybe is better suited in support of the main striker Salpigidis got a whole 25min give a spot on the bench.

[chameleon65]

I totally agree no motion or creativityand also that our midfield is the biggest problem and for me a slight surprise cause I would think Zago, Basinas, Karagounis and Stelios can create things for the offense.

If they can't break thru the midfield then you see long passes or crosses from the wings or mid up to the front of the goal and so Charisteas has the only chance to trap the ball or redirect with headers but he's unable to make the moves since he'e not that talented and the defenders all over him. Plus Vryzas cannot do everything on his own and try to pass all the defenders to reach the goal. And it also seems that they panic lately.

Other teams know our weaknesses since euro04 (Mid and 1-2 strikers with not much flare) and are taking full advantage of it. Mind you our primary weapon which is defense has been shattered. I cannot believe that Dellas is the only player that can do the job at the back and keep the defense rock solid.

Hopefully like the players said when it comes down to the next qualifiers, they'll perfrom and get results.

[AEK-MTL]

I would'nt push the panic button just yet. Yeah, we haven't scored in 6 games and yeah our midfield isn't producing anything offensively. Looks like our NT is struggling right now. Nevertheless, I have faith in Rehhagel. The guy knows who's good and who isn't. If he isn't satisfied, the player will sit. I think he'll bench Basinas for the next game and start Katsouranis, Zagorakis, Karagounis, and Giannakopoulos against Kazakhstan. That way, in theory, we have two defensive midfielders and 2 offensive midfielders. Second, I think he'll stick with Vryzas and Charisteas, seeing as they didn't really do all that bad in the last game. As much as I'd like to see Pap and Lybe in there, I just don't see Rehhagel dropping his 2 starters. I think Lybe should definitely come on as a substitute however if either Vryzas or Charisteas are playing like crap. As for the backline; here's where things get interesting. Seitaridis and Fyssas are fine where they are IMO. It's the centers that are the real question. Kapsis played poorly against Belgium and Dellas likely won't be match-fit in time for the Kazakhstan game. I still think Kapsis is a solid CB, just that he was rusty. As for Dellas, remember the game is against Kazakhstan, so I don't much fear their attacking prowess. So I say what the heck. Start the very same team that won us the Euro, except put in Katsouranis over Basinas and if game is scoreless after first half, put Lybe in.

[Korisos]

i think the reason is otto keeps selecting the same mids, lybe should have been called much sooner and i tihnk he played well cos he has something to prove and wants a place on this team. instead of sticking w/ the same old mids otto should have made a few subs. i'm not saying replace them completely but maybe call up lybe sooner and give more time to kafes, so if the starters saw that their place was threatened then they would be moving their asses a little bit more don't you think? otto needs to create a competition for starting places in midfield then i think we will see better movement.

[plato-ny]

If Greece cant score, then a tie against Kazakhstan might happen.