Kostas Katsouranis and Giannis Maniatis
In the recent Greek Cup quarter-final, Kostas Katsouranis, playing for PAOK, and Giannis Maniatis, playing for Olympiakos, had a proper fight. It all started when Katsouranis, who was substituted minutes earlier and was watching the game from the bench, grabbed Maniatis’s arm while he was in the middle of a throw-in. Katsouranis then allegedly added insult to injury by cursing at him, which Maniatis did not take to kindly. A fight broke out; a fight that soon spread to players from both teams. Both Maniatis and Katsouranis got a red card. Katsouranis missed the Cup Final as a result, which PAOK went on to win 1-0.
Could this destabilise the all important Greece team spirit? Maniatis and Katsouranis are not only team-mates, they are not only playing side-by-side in the midfield, but they were also room-mates throughout the two year qualifying campaign to Brazil.
Fernando Santos
In the beginning of 2014, the Greek Football Federation and Fernando Santos announced that his contract will not be extended past the Brazil World Cup. Mainly due to the consistent form over the past 10 years that has resulted in Greece holding the No10 position in the Fifa world rankings, coaching Greece is quite an attractive career move for well-established coaches across the world. Of course, money also helps. Juande Ramos, Martin Jol, John van den Brom and Marco Tardelli are all on the shortlist, with the Spaniard looking like the candidate with the best chance to succeed Fernando Santos and continue the legacy established by Otto Rehhagel.
George Karagkounis
George Karagkounis, the Greek captain, is always at the front line when it comes to the national squad. On the field, he is the driving factor, always talking and directing his team-mates. Off the pitch, however, is a different matter. When the game ends and the team is getting ready to leave, Karagkounis is typically Greek. He is the very last one to leave the dressing room and the last one to board the team bus. “Speed it up George, we are going to miss the plane to the World Cup and there’s no way we are going to Brazil without you” his team-mates have been known to shout at him.
Takis Fyssas
Both Fernando Santos and Takis Fyssas, the technical director, work very hard on lifting their players psychologically. Before crucial games, Santos sometimes writes notes to his players with inspirational quotes for all of them. He prepares a separate note for each player and sticks it on door of the player’s hotel room so that it is the last thing he sees when he closes the door the night before the game and the first thing to see when he opens the door on game day. Fyssas is perhaps even more cunning, instead opting on giving his players print-outs of derogatory comments from opponents. Ιt seems to do the trick.
Stavros Drakoularakos is a sports writer at Sport24.gr