Greece confident ahead of Sweden test

The Greece players say they are entirely focused on the challenge of defending their European crown and believe they are fully aware of the threat posed by Sweden in their opening UEFA EURO 2008™ game in six days' time.

Minor details
Midfielder Kostas Katsouranis, a stalwart of the triumphant campaign four years ago, said: "Sweden have players who feature at great European clubs. We know their calibre individually and as a team. We are going to go through every minor detail with our head coach and I believe that we will be ready to counter them on Tuesday."
 
'Beautiful feeling'
Wednesday's training session in Seekirchen, the day after Greece's arrival in Austria, met with an enthusiastic response from the public as 1,000 turned out to see the reigning champions. "The fans who will come from Greece and from other places of Europe to support us will be very helpful during the match," Katsouranis acknowledged. "Anything that will help us keep our morale high is most welcome. It's only natural that so many people turned out today to watch our training. We are the European champions and that's a beautiful feeling."

New boy
While Katsouranis has been down this road before, Nikos Spiropoulos is the new boy on the block and he is attempting to take it all in. "For me, this season is like a dream," said the left-back. "First my transfer [from Panionios GSS] to Panathinaikos [FC] and now I get to participate with the European champions in a major tournament."

Poor displays
The 24-year-old is aware that Greece's performances in their last friendly games left much to be desired: "We didn't perform well, we know that. But we will be ready to take on Sweden. We know them well, but the final result will depend on how we perform next Tuesday."

Training absentees
There were a number of absentees from the group who were put through their paces by coach Otto Rehhagel in Seekirchen. Playmaker Giorgos Karagounis didn't participate due to an inflammation of his left knee. He worked out in the team's hotel gym and is expected to return to full training on Thursday. Of the four players who have complained of groin problems, striker Angelos Charisteas and left-back Vassilis Torosidis did some light jogging while right-back Christos Patsatzoglou and defensive midfielder Alexandros Tziolis were rested. They are all expected to resume regular training by the end of the week.

Birthday boy
With fatigue evident in Sunday's encounter against Armenia, Rehhagel has reduced the training intensity. In the practice match fans cheered every goal, the most spectacular being a long-range effort scored by Giourkas Seitaridis. The Atlético de Madrid defender had already been the centre of attention on Wednesday as he celebrated his 27th birthday.