The Hindu : Sport : Ibrahimovic’s brilliance breaks Greek resistance

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Sport

Ibrahimovic’s brilliance breaks Greek resistance

Daniel Taylor

Salzburg (Austria): Salzburg may be the city of Mozart and The Sound of Music, but the reigning champions produced a performance here on Tuesday night that was football’s equivalent of Les Dawson playing the piano. Everyone loves an underdog but Greece sometimes made it difficult with their killjoy tactics and, on this evidence, their defence of the title is unlikely to last long.

They were undone on Tuesday night by two goals in the space of five second-half minutes, the first being the best strike of the tournament so far, courtesy of Zlatan Ibrahimovic, followed soon afterwards by a more scruffy effort from Petter Hansson at close range.

Sweden were comfortably the better side and, not for the first time, it was difficult to comprehend how Greece had managed to upset the football world in Euro 2004.

Same tactics

Of the Greece starting line-up, six players had winners’ medals from the Euro final in Lisbon four years ago.

Their coach is still the gruff Otto Rehhagel and the tactics remain the same — a packed defence, frustrated opponents and the occasional long ball punted into the opposition penalty area.

It is a style that has elevated them from 61st in FIFA’s rankings in 2004 to eighth, one place above England.

But by half-time Sweden were looking the more dangerous side, playing with greater width and penetration, with Fredrik Ljungberg impressive on the left and Ibrahimovic combining neatly with Henrik Larsson in attack.

Narrow miss

Ibrahimovic had the best chance of this period, his header going narrowly over the crossbar after he had been picked out by Ljungberg.

Greece were often content just to pass the ball around their own defence, although Angelos Charisteas tested Andreas Isaksson in the Swedish goal with an early run and shot.

And Angelos Basinas did likewise just before the interval with a low 30-yard effort.

At least Rehhagel recognised he needed to brighten up his attack, but his response was to bring on Giorgos Samaras, a striker who has been nicknamed “Tragedy” by Manchester City’s fans.

Inventive football

Despite Samaras’s arrival, the more inventive football continued to come from the team in yellow.

Christian Wilhelmsson should have done better early in the second half with a chance to lob over Greece’s goalkeeper, Antonis Nikopolidis, and soon afterwards there were increasingly loud whistles from the Swedish supporters about what they perceived to be time-wasting with only an hour of the game gone.

Plan blown apart

Finally, the Greek masterplan was blown apart with Ibrahimovic exchanging passes with Larsson and thundering in a diagonal shot that was still rising as it flew past Nikopolidis into the top corner, his first goal in 16 internationals.

The second was a much different affair, Ljungberg being denied by Nikopolidis only for the ball to loop towards the goal in the subsequent scramble and, finally, squeeze inside the post after ricocheting between Hansson and the defender Giourkas Seitaridis.

The result: Sweden 2 ( Zlatan Ibrahimovic 67, Petter Hansson 72) bt Greece 0. — © Guardian Newspapers Limited, 2008.