Euro 2012 Opener: Poland + Refs – 1, Greece – 1
When Robert Lewandowski scored for Poland in the 17th minute, it looked like the flood gates could soon spring open; Poland had been dominating Greece since the opening whistle (which followed an odd, acid-induced opening ceremony), exploiting an embarrassingly weak left flank that left Polish midfielders with total freedom to lob crosses onto unmarked strikers in the box. Lewandowski’s goal was the logical conclusion of said weakness, and with the majority-Polish Warsaw crowd going absolutely bonkers, to say that the Greeks looked timid and demoralized would be an understatement. Sokratis Papastathopoulos picking up two very questionable yellows and being sent off in the 44th minute didn’t help, either. (Although his exit reminded us once again that all we are is dust in the wind.)
However, football has a way of deviating from scripted storylines. Down to ten men, the Greeks came out firing after half-time, with substitute Dimitris Salpigidis cleaning up a messy play out front and knocking in an improbable goal with his first touch on the ball. For the rest of the match the crowd was a little quieter, and the Greeks a little surer of themselves as they settled down and finally looked like a team that had showed up to play football.
Their efforts came to fruition with a 71st minute red card against Polish goalkeeper Wojciech Szczesny. But it ended up being all for naught, as substitute goalkeeper Pzremyslaw Tyton easily saved Giorgios Karagounis’ rather mediocre penalty attempt into the lower right hand corner. This kick was Greece’s best chance to take three points away from the match, but in the end, a 1-1 draw is to be lauded, especially considering the downright egregious refereeing throughout.
Both yellow cards on Papastathopolous were jokes, really, and with ten men Greece was severely limited in its attacking capabilities in the second half. Considering the gifts given to them by the refs, and the extremely partizan crowd, Poland should be kicking themselves for not closing against the disordered and exhausted Greeks. With this opening draw, Group A is, as was expected, completely wide open; any team has a legitimate chance to move on to the next stage. Euro 2012 has certainly not disappointed in its opener, and although hard to imagine, I’m now even more excited about what’s in store than I was at 11:30 AM Central Time.
