gk.blog: World Cup 2010 Finals: Greece 2

FINALLY! GOAL(S)! AND A WIN!!

After four tries and four bad performances in two World Cups Greece scored twice and won over Nigeria in a game that was possibly decided on a bad decision of a Nigerian player. Sani Kaita kicked Torosidis and saw a straight red card; That was a big moment in the game. From that point on Greece became an aggressive, attacking team and it took another brilliant performance by Vincent Enyeama, the Nigerian keeper, to keep the game close and the Nigerians in the game. You could argue that playing 11 vs 10 is an automatic win but that is not true (e.g. see France 0 – Uruguay 0.)

Greece had 10 shots on goal (versus 3 for Nigeria) the most by any team in this World Cup. Greece also had the ball 60% of the time and 11 corners (versus 3 for Nigeria). I can only assume that the ejection of the Nigerian player boosted the confidence of the Greek players. Greece was in a desperate position, they smelled blood, and they responded. They pushed forward relentlessly and they scored two goals and thus the first victory for Greece in a World Cup.

The ESPN GameCast showed that the average position of the Greeks was in the Nigerian half.

Kudos to Coach Rehhagel for:

Fielding the youngest ever Greece line-up at the World Cup (average age: 28 years, 46 days).
Replacing Seitaridis, Samaras, and Charisteas with Papastathopoulos, Kyrgiakos, and Salpingidis in the starting line-up.
Taking advantage of the situation immediately and substituting a defender (Papastathopoulos) for a forward (Samaras) and changing the formation to a more attacking one (4-3-3.)

The goals:

The first ever goal scored by Greece in a World Cup was by Salpingidis in the 44th minute. Salpingidis shot from the edge of the box, the ball deflected of a Nigerian player and flew in the upper left corner of the goalpost.

The second goal was scored by Torosidis in the 71st minute. Alexandros Tziolis took a low shot from way outside the box(he is not very shy about taking long shots), Enyeama tried to scoop the ball up, lost it, and Torosidis was there to take control of the ball and score.