itsbeautifuloutside

Greece v Ivory Coast

Fortaleza, 24th June 2014

Match Report

Georgios Samaras scored from a controversial penalty deep into injury time, when the referee decided that Giovanni Sio had fouled Samaras in the penalty area. The Ivorians were incensed, claiming with some justification having watched the replays, that Samaras had kicked the ground and then fallen over, but the referee, Carlos Vera, was having none of it and pointed to the spot.

Ivory Coast had started the day in second spot and with several stars in their ranks could have expected to progress to the last 16. The reality is that they end up being too cautious too often, a result of the level of unrealistic expectation levels of their countrymen.

Greece started their day bottom of their group, and things did not look too good for them when they had to make a couple of substitutions within the first half an hour, including their goalkeeper Orestis Karnezis with a back injury.

In spite of these misfortunes, Greece still looked the more enterprising, with Samaras leading the attack. In the dying minutes of the first half they took the lead, courtesy of a goal from the Olympiakos midfielder, Alexandros Samaris.

Ivory Coast stepped up their game and had far more possession in the early part of the second half, but a goal would not come. During this period Karagounis managed to hit the crossbar with a speculative long range shot. It was not until past the 70th minute that the African side managed an equaliser from a rapid counter-attack with Gervinho providing the assist for Bony to shoot past the substitute goalkeeper.

The Ivory Coast bench and the fans celebrated as surely that would be enough to see them progress, but it all turned to dust for them with the 93rd minute penalty.

Greece now face Ivory Coast in Recife on Sunday, 29th June at 9pm. I am sure that it will not have escaped your attention that if England had won their group, instead of finishing bottom . . . . . . . .

channonite