Greece Line-Up: Chalkias (Sifakis, 23'), Torosidis, Holebas, K.Papadopoulos, Karagounis (c), Katsouranis, Fortounis (Mitroglu, 71') , Maniatis, Salpingidis, Samaras, Fotakis (Gekas, 45')
Czech Republic Line-Up: Cech, Sivok, Kadlec, Selassie, Limbersky, Rosicky (Kolar, 45', Rajtoral, 90'), Hubschman, Jiracek, Baros (Pekhart, 64') , Plasil, Pilar
Czech Republic get their tournament back on track, taking full advantage of the slow starting Greeks. Greece are now desperately needing a victory over Russia in their final game if they are to stand any hope of progressing into the knock-out phase.
With Greece's centre-back pairing unavailable, the Czech Republic instantly opened the defence up with a through ball that Petr Jiracek slotted past Kostas Chalkias after just three minutes. It was then two goals in six minutes when Selassie found acres of space to provide a low cross that was fumbled over the line by Vaclav Pilar.
After that, the two didn't really trouble either keeper. That was until the 20th minute when Chalkias was forced off with a hamstring injury and had to be replaced by Michalis Sifakis. Greece's closest chance to get back into the game before half-time saw Georgios Fotakis head a cross into the net, which Petr Cech maybe should have done better with. But it didn't matter as the linesman had put his flag up for offside, replays showed it was extremely close.
Just like in the Poland game, Greece played better in the second half with Theofanis Gekas brought into the game. The substitution paid off within eight minutes when a loose ball was rolling into the path of Cech. But the Champions League winner had a slight mix-up with a defender and the ball rebounded to Gekas who put the ball home.
But Greece couldn't come back against an improved Czech Republic side. Cech's howler didn't cost his side but he will be hoping for a better game against Poland in the final group match.
No comments:
Post a Comment