Olympiacos Piraeus

[tjbc]

Roller hockey??  that made me laugh! Futsal is popular in spain too, but not soo much in Greece.

And yes I agree about the basketball. Greeks play an extremely tactical game. Spanoulis is everything good and everything bad about our basketball. Natural ability yet impatient and egotistic. We have many good players but at the moment a very stupid Italian coach.

What helps is Greeks are actually naturally quite big athletes so many are made to play basketball. When I went to Italy I was amazed how short most people are. It is not uncommon to see Greeks the size of Printezis sometimes in Athens.

Also yes, many of the Athens Olympic venues were neglected badly.. was ridiculous..

Not a joke. 
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bpu5iEhkG1Q
It's really big in Catalunya too. Barcelona is the most sucessful club in the world.

I haven't followed very closely international basketball recently but yes, you've been away from the decisions too much.

I think the struggling serb Faliro is talking about was Djuricic.

Edit: Ok, Matic also been shit this season.

Tomorrow can be a turning point from Benfica this season. But most probably it will be a very boring game that will end in 1-0 or 2-0 to Olympiacos. We always struggle in those atmospheres. We lost away to a very weak Fenerbahçe when we were on top form last year so...

Cada vez que vejo esse video da final da Liga Europeia vem-me um sorriso à cara. Levarem na pá na própria casa num caixote CHEIO de porcos. P-R-I-C-E-L-E-S-S

[Faliro]

Faliro, this is a little bit off-topic, but what is your opinion about the greek crisis?

I am not an average Greek - just warning you.

I believe the crisis is a result of ultra leftist politics in Greece for 2 decades. Greece was booming under the Junta in the 1970s - pretty much 90% of Athens was rebuilt between the 60s-70s. Everyone was coming to Greece to invest, Coca Cola, banks, agencies. Roads were built, industry was invested in. Then the junta collapsed and the socialists took over. They closed Greece to capitalism in many ways making it so bureaucratically expensive and complex to invest in Greece, no one bothered. Greece was taking out international loans to pay for its bloated public sector for many many years. Each election, the winning party would promise yet more public sector jobs that were not needed.

Many of Greece's most powerful assets were destroyed by the left. A good example is the Piraeus ship yards. Piraeus is one of the biggest ports in Europe and important globally. It was destroyed the last 20 years by constant strikes, career unionists making the docks unworkable and corrupt leftist activists. Many docks are now mostly deserted except the one Greece sold to COSCO the Chinese government firm. They are running at maximum efficiency and making millions in their dock in Piraeus. Greece knows it can't do this with the remaining docks because employing Greeks means strikes and overpaid workers in a market with very tight margins.

Many Greeks believe in a global conspiracy. I believe the banks knew they would destroy Greece when they raised our interest rates and turned us to junk status, but it was the natural leftist corruption of Greece that destroyed the country before any of that. Even today we have leftist bombs going off every day, 3 communist parties.. and over one million illegal immigrants who are almost exclusively muslim - if you say it is too many and it has destroyed the country, many will call you a racist etc.. even though they pay no tax and crime has risen dramatically since their arrival (Government and police both admit this).

If you remove the Greek left, Greece becomes like Switzerland. With the Greek left we are doomed. We should have killed them all in the civil war - they were murdering whole villages who would not join their 'revolution,' but all we did when we won the civil war was expel many and let the rest live. There were no executions. When the Junta fell in the 1970's, the first thing Papandreou did was invite back to Greece all the hardcore communists who had been expelled for murders and ultra leftist violence etc.. He even gave them all pensions as a good will gesture. 

However I am sure you will meet many Greeks who will say Greece is a fascist state..and the zionists planned the whole crisis bla bla bla...

[loftarasa]

Quase um espelho.

[HenriqueSLB]

Are the greek football fans aware of Futebol Clube do Porto corruption cases?

[Festivus]

Faliro, this is a little bit off-topic, but what is your opinion about the greek crisis?

However I am sure you will meet many Greeks who will say Greece is a fascist state..and the zionists planned the whole crisis bla bla bla...

Lunatics like that are everywhere, especially in the USA haha.

[Faliro]

Well my instinct was 1-1 before the game, but we managed to win. As the commentator said,

Roberto 1
Benfica 0

Now I can be more upfront about the circumstances following the game. We played on Wednesday a cup game in Amfissa - easily the worst stadium and pitch I have seen in Greece. The surface was like a wasteland. We won the game but it was a tough work out and everyone looked tired after the game. Then on Saturday we had to play PAO. We really wanted to beat them and we played almost our first 11. After 90 minutes of kicking, fouling and violence, we scored on the 90th minute and won. Our players were drained. Michel hid from the media our injuries very well. Weiss was not fit enough to make the team as he had a bruised thigh, Domingues was only 60% fit and that is why he came on second half. Fuster has played the full 90 at PAO and was the best player besides Mitroglou. Manolas, Siovas, Samaris, Holebas, Salinas, Maniatis, Mitroglou also played the full 90 at PAO.

Today Samaris was non existent most the game and Maniatis has no brains, so the fear came true, they gave the ball to Benfica and waited 90 minutes to see what would happen... i thought we looked weaker when Saviola came off.

Benfica took control and started to try and find ways through - each time there was either a defender there or Roberto who I thought was once again exceptional. The fans tried to lift the team but it was hard work, no one had an energy left and today we were slower.

I thought Benfica looked good in spells, they worked hard to keep possession. They don't seem to have a killer instinct in front of goal and Robert was not willing to let anything past him.

It was a very stressful game and I think if the game was a knock out game that had to go to penalties we would have probably seen some red cards in extra time. this was our worse game this season and not the way we play, but that is a compliment to Benfica and also our exhaustion. Your coach seemed to be going crazy.

Now, to make things more crazy, we play the second placed team in Greece on Sunday - PAOK at home. This is our biggest game of the season after PAO and Benfica - many of our players are burnt out now as most also start for the Greek national team..Siovas, Holebas, Maniatis etc..

Well, now we have Anderlecht at home and we have some breathing space. I am still shocked at what I saw, it is the first time this season I have seen Olympiakos sitting and waiting and it was not nice. Roberto and Manolas... well played.

[Faliro]

Are the greek football fans aware of Futebol Clube do Porto corruption cases?

i am not aware and I am not sure about others, most probably not.

[Darkboy]

Reminded me of the Europa League final against Chelsea. We are used to dominate while being unable to score a f'ing goal. Honestly there's almost no chance of a turnaround. You guys have now a 95% chance of going through to the next round.

[X-Blazer]

Congrats Faliro, good luck to the rest of your campaign. That unfortunately for us, should go on besides the group stage.

[Fever]

Lucky win for Olympiacos, great night for Roberto. He deserves it, I think his celebration at the ends shows how much the criticism and mocking has got to him.

I think you're through. Good luck in the remaining of your european campaign 

[Festivus]

 We tried but our finishing was pretty poor, as usual.

Congrats for the victory.

[Faliro]

Thanks guys.

We definitely scraped through. We had no answers today. Hopefully your team can build on this performance. I think you can do some damage in the europa.

For me today you were only missing a good striker.

[Festivus]

Thanks guys.

We definitely scraped through. We had no answers today. Hopefully your team can build on this performance. I think you can do some damage in the europa.

For me today you were only missing a good striker.

Interesting that you noted that you had the worst performance of the season so far, while some of us believe this was our best one so far. Football can be really ironic sometimes. Oh well, what matters is winning and you're the ones who ended up grabbing the victory.

And yeah, Cardozo getting injured sucked balls. He's our top striker.

[Faliro]

Was our worst game in quite a while. I can't remember the last time Olympiacos did not have possession for that long. That is due to the quality of your players today and their fitness. Very very few teams have that kind of possession at the karaiskaki which tells me your team is on the verge of being powerful again.

[Festivus]

Was our worst game in quite a while. I can't remember the last time Olympiacos did not have possession for that long. That is due to the quality of your players today and their fitness. Very very few teams have that kind of possession at the karaiskaki which tells me your team is on the verge of being powerful again.

Too bad we've seen this a lot of times before. Playing decently but not winning(see: Europa League's final). We're sick of moral victories.