Greece Vs Russia

Both sides lost their opening group games and will be looking to pick up 3 points......

Will Greece decide to come out and play some football instead of passing the ball
round at the back the whole game as if there scared to cross the half way line?.....

Can Russia bounce back from their opening game defeat by Spain and show an improvement?
They are still without Arshavin their best player who is serving out the final game of his 2 match ban.

I think the Greeks will just have enough to win if they can be a bit more adventurerous

Greece 1 v 0 Russia

I think this might be the game even though Arshavin is still out that we see the Russians spark into life and get off the mark. If they can get the ball moving quickly and attack at pace they can be very effective and the Greeks are fairly slow at the back and particularly unadventurous, giving Russia the license to commit more players forward. Hiddink has to get it right today though, and for me that means starting Bystrov.

3-1 to Russia as a bold prediction.

1-2 Russia

I fancy a Greek win today by the usual scoreline of 1-0...

Well Russia are 1-0 up at Half time.

As i expected Russia attacking at a high tempo, as it suits the way they play. Better side in the first half and deserve their lead. What on earth was Nikopolodis doing for the goal though , chasing the attacker like that hen he should of let the Defender deal with it and get back in his goal, a simple tap in for Zyryanov in the end. Zhirkov and Anyukov bursting forward again whenever the opportunity arises. The Greeks just look a really poor team, Charisteas should have buried that chance he had early on.

I think the Russians should bring on Bystrov as the Greek defence begin to tire, because his sheer speed will cause them all sorts of problems.

Finishes 1-0 to the Russians in the end and the Greeks are out of the tournament after another quite feeble performance. The Russians fully deserved the win, and should really have had the game out of sight in the second half with the chances they had, they attack in numbers and at great pace and were a real handful for the Greeks, who were lucky to only lose by the one goal. Greece were better than they were against Sweden but they were still pedestrian and very ordinary, only fashioning one or two real chances for themselves and Karagounis was reduced to pulling long range efforts in the Second half.

This win sets up a real tasty encounter with the Swedes, the winner going into the quarter finals to meet the Dutch.

was a lively match.. that guy, #19 of Russia, wasted too many chances...

Yeah Pavlyuchenko is a rather frustrating player, he clearly has ability but sometimes has the tendency to be perhaps a little greedy and even lazy at times.

Gus thinks a lot of his potential and sometimes - not too often - Gus looks right.
Our chances vs. Sweden are 40%.

I can see Russia beating Sweden. Arshavin will be back as well.

Greece were pretty poor at times. Terrible keeping for the goal.

Likely that Sweden will score against them but the counter attacking was fantastic from Russia, which lacked in the final shot on goal. Zhirkov Man of the match which is great for a team with 2 excellent attacking full-backs. He almost got a cracker of a free-kick in.

The match against Sweden will be one to watch for sure...could go either way, Russia needing the win.

Does anyone remember Zhirkov's goal against Hamburg?

Absolutely stunning. I'm glad he's doing well in this competition as well.

It was December 2006, and it was really brilliant.
The talks have just begun of his transfer to Zenit, and it would be a very serious strengthening before CL.
For all that, Ibra is Ibra and we have just hope that Gus knows what to do with that guy.

After watching the highlights for this game, i dont think the scoreline flatters Russia enough tbh. Greece are just so casual and lazy, Russia could have scored so many more. They had an attack towards the end where it was a 4 on 2 situation, and somehow Pavyluchenko hits it over. The mistake from the keeper's point of view was a right shambles, he gave the Russians a goal out of nothing.

On a par, if not better than Maradona. Although Zhirkov is Russian, so not likely to get too much priase had he been a South American.

Watching Greece, it puts their win last time as one of the biggest miracles ever. They even had Stelios on the bench.

what the hell was their keeper doing??

he is solely to blame for the loss.

It was indefensible, the defender could have dealt with it sufficiently and they probably would not of scored. Suicidal goalkeeping at its best.

oh yeah, good result!
I liked the way guys played, but I'd prefer more short passes, not so many long.
Sure, there was a certain part of luck when we scored the goal, but the goal was deserved after the bunch of moments.
Very good, so we're waiting for the next match and one guy's returning. Hopes set on him should come true.

The game was pretty crap. Passing was mince. The goal was poor. If russia qualify ahead of sweden i can see the dutch being guranteed a place in the semis