USA 94: The Greek Monumental Achievement That Was Crushed - Part 1

USA 94: The Greek Monumental Achievement that was crushed

By Greg Gavalas

Backdrop

The FIFA World Cup of 1994 in the United States holds a very strong spot in my heart, so when we at Hellas Football decided to do a piece about how Greece achieved their first qualification birth, I was going to do this no matter what.

The reasons this World Cup is so special for me is because I lived it like no other, I watched every game and I could not get enough of the stadiums, crowds, goals, attacking football and just the quality of it all, the fact Greece had qualified for it may have had something to do with it as well as my admiration for Roberto Baggio, so we know how it ended for both ironically. 

That aside I think there was something special about football in the 90’s as it stepped up in professionalism, some of the talents were a great joy to watch and this World Cup had many. 

When I put my hand up to do this I thought, I am really going to deep dive into this and really try grasp how Greece did such an amazing job in qualifying undefeated only to endure such a horrible campaign on the biggest stage of them all which I am sure many of us reading this can remember our personal accounts of the three games.

The other items that I have always wondered about, was player selections and how it came that players well in their 30’s were such key players vs others who I considered much more skilled and what could have been.

Group Draw

The draw for the qualification groups was done on December of 1991, Greece was in pool 3 and drew Russia from pool 1, Yugoslavia from pool 2, Hungary from pool 3, Iceland from pool 5 and Luxembourg from pool 6.

The top two teams would qualify from the groups and it was set to be a battle between Russia, Yugoslavia and Greece, who was hopping to make history and get to the grand stage, however in October 1992, after Yugoslavia’s games with Russia and Iceland were postponed, FIFA banned the Yugo’s after the United Nations made sanctions on the republic stemming from the Yugoslav Wars.

The Ethniki had a huge chance to qualify now and Coach Alketas Panagoulias would be the man in charge after he had lead Greece to their only other major tournament appearance previously at Euro 1980 in Italy.

Group Matches

Game 1

Greece and Iceland would get UEFA Group 5 under way on May 13 1992 at the Olympic Stadium in Athens.

A small crowd of 3,000 would see Greece win 1-0 thanks to a goal from Takis Sofianopoulos in the 28th minute. 

The match would see Giorgos Mitsibonas make his second last appearance for the Ethiniki which finished up in the next game played in September, a 3-2 loss to Cyprus in a friendly, this match was also the last of Antonis Georgiadis as coach.

Following Greece’s home win, Iceland went onto beat Hungary 2-1 in Budapest which was a big blow for the Hungarians, they would bounce back with a 3-0 away win over Luxembourg.

Game 2

The Ethniki’s next qualifier would be against Iceland away and it would be tricky but Greece played well and came away victors 1-0 thanks to a header from Giotis Tsalouhidis.

Notables from this game was the appearance of Giorgos Donis, the 2nd cap for Kostas Frantzeskos and the back four that would feature heavily – Stratos Apostolakis, Stelios Manolas, Giannis Kalitzakis and Thanasis Kolitsidakis who had been brought in under Panagolias’s reign.

Greece was off to a good start, with the 4 points in the bag (this was the last campaign that offered 2 points for a win) they were now 2 points clear of Hungary and Iceland, with the latter having a game in hand too.

Russia would join Greece on 4 points with wins over Iceland and Luxembourg in October ’92.

Game 3

Greece’s last game of 1992 would be at the Kaftanzoglio stadium in Thessaloniki, a crowd of over 35,000 would see the Ethniki host Hungary in a tight match that had a lot riding on it. Both teams had chances to win the game but it would end a goalless draw which highlighted one of Greece’s dilemma’s – scoring goals. 

Vasilis Dimitriadis was the teams striker but he was not having a great goal to game ratio, as well the team, whilst solid defensively, wasn’t creating a huge amount of chances as yet.

Game 4

The New Year (1993) saw Greece kick off Group 5 again and this time at home to Luxembourg in Athens at the OAKA on the 17th of February.

Greece opened the scoring in the half hour after a dubious penalty was awarded on Frantzeskos which Dimitriadis converted to score only his second goal for Greece.

Greece’s second goal would come from a very usual way through this campaign, a free kick taken this time by Apostolakis saw Tasos “Rambo” Mitropoulos rise up and header home in the 65th minute. 

Half way mark

This put Greece half of the way there. After 4 games Greece had 7 points with 3 wins and a draw, they had scored 4 and were yet to concede. 

The way the draw had been done, Greece had more games earlier on than Russia but as long as the Ethniki kept winning points and with Iceland the only other team on 4 games with just 2 points. Greece’s next game against Hungary away from home was a huge game. Hellas Football. Follow @GregGavalas