Greece vs Sweden preview

Posted on | June 9, 2008 | 1 Comment

Holders Greece start their European title defence when they face Sweden in the Austrian city of Salzburg. Otto Rehhagel and his boys will be hoping for an encore of their opening day Euro 2004 2-1 win over Portugal, but Sweden with a ” returned from retirement ” Henrik Larsson will be stiff opposition.

This game promises to be an extremely physical one. Greece’s central defenders- Krygiakos and Dellas, are giants by footballing standards. They will also come in useful in deadball situations, where Greece are expected to really trouble Sweden. Dellas and Krygiakos will also use their height to neutralise the threat that Zlatan Ibrahimovic poses in the air. Karagounis had a knee injury, but is expected to be fit to play this game. Karagounis should line up with Katsouranis and skipper Basinas in midfield. Charisteas, Amanatidis and Greece’s top scorer in qualifying Theofanis Gekas, will hunt for goals upfront. Greece topped Group C in qualifying and conceded 10 goals in 12 games, the lowest in their group. They were the second team to assure themselves of a spot at Euro 2008. Nikopolidis has not conceded a game in his last three games at the European Championships, and will look to keep another clean sheet.

Some consider Sweden as the weakest team in Group C. However they do have some wordclass talent at their disposal. Lars Lagerback is at his third consecutive European Championship. Sweden surprised the footballing world by recalling Henrik Larsson for this tournament. Larsson and Ibrahimovic’s are Lagerback’s best pairing upfront, with Elmander and Rosenborg the other available strikers. Ibrahimovic has however not scored in his fourteen international games, which indicates that he is long due for a goal. There are question marks being raised over the fitness of midfielder Tobias Linderoth. He should start, but may be substituted later in the game. With Erik Edman out of this tournament, Mikael Nilsson should take the left back spot, with Hansson and Mellberg in central defence. Freddie Ljungberg is a major threat down the flanks with his pace and trickery, and Seitaridis would have taken note of that.

Greece did not do too well at their final warm up games, losing to Hungary and drawing with Armenia. Neither have Sweden for that matter- a win over Slovenia was followed by a loss to Ukraine. Do not expect too many goals from this one. Greece to probably nick this 1-0, with the goal coming from Dellas/Gekas.

Related posts:

1. Russia vs Sweden preview
2. Greece vs Russia preview
3. Spain vs Sweden preview
4. World Cup Sweden vs Paraguay
5. Greece vs Nigeria betting preview- Group B

Comments