Greece Pay The Penalty Despite Domination

Greece paid the ultimate penalty last night as they crashed out of the World Cup at the last 16 stage to a determined and a fighting Costa Rica side. After 120 minutes of near total domination, Greece must wonder how they did not manage to win this tie against a side lacking any real quality but had true spirit as shown in the group stage. Despite this, Costa Rica progress to the quarter-finals for the first time in their history following a 5-3 penalty shoot out victory, after it finished 1-1 after extra time.

The first half was certainly a slow and dull encounter with neither side creating many chances and the majority of the play in the middle third. Greece did however have the majority of the possession but their build up play took far too long to pose any real danger. Dimitris Salpingidis did have the best chance for the Greeks but his effort was well saved by the Costa Rica keeper Navas- the first save of many. 

Greece again started the second half dominating possession but it was Costa Rica who made the breakthrough with one of their first efforts on goal. Bryan Ruiz converted his effort from the edge of the area into the corner of the goal, a very weak finish that somehow found its way in. Certainly all too easy as far as Costa Rica were concerned.

Costa Rica then should have been awarded a penalty shortly after when an apparent hand ball from Torosidis went unnoticed by the referee. Duarte was then sent off for a second bookable offence on 65 minutes, reducing Costa Rica to 10 men and certainly allowing them to focus on defending for the rest of the match. 

As the second half wore on, it looked like Greece were never going to find the all elusive equaliser. Again, their build up play was extremely long and mostly broken down by a dogged Costa Rican defence. Gekas and Fulham’s record singing Mitroglou went close before eventually in the 91st minute, defender Papastathopoulos fired home his first international goal. Greece then almost won it with the last kick of the 90 but Navas pulled off a tremendous save to deny Mitroglou.

Greece looked like the most likely side to progress in extra time but Navas made two more saves denying the Greeks once again. Greece’s best chance came with two minutes left of extra time as Christodoulopoulos found himself through on goal but was stopped by the excellent Navas to take the tie into the dreaded penalty shootout.  

The first seven penalty kicks were put away with ease before Navas made his most decisive save denying Gekas which left Umana to put Costa Rica through to their first ever World Cup Quarter-Final, with a 5-3 penalty win.

Greece will only have themselves to blame that they did not make it through. Poor build up play and a lack of real quality on the wings cost them dear in a match where they had 23 shots with 8 on target to Costa Rica’s 7 attempts all match. It is clear then that the true hero was the Costa Rica and Levante goalkeeper Keylor Navas.