I'm going to cut this short. Spain dominated the entire match with plenty of shots littered over the 90 minutes. Xabi Alonso had a very good match starting in the first 11 as captain, and he showed his trademark of spectacular goals by testing retiring goalkeeper Nikopoulidis from his own half with another wonder-strike. The Greek keeper backpedalled and in an attempt to tip the ball away (which was going inches out anyway) injured himself slightly when he collided against the goalpost.
Greece took the lead against the run of play when Charisteas headed in a beautiful free-kick unmarked. Spain tried their best to equalise in the 2nd half, and almost did so when Alonso crashed another 30yard thunderbolt against the post. Spain equalised when De La Red fired in a sweet volley after Sergio Garcia laid him off with a good header. In the final few minutes, Dani Guiza was left unmarked and the far post and headed in the winner from close range from a floating cross.
The Russian beat the Swedes convincingly with a display of football that Hiddink will be proud of. Pavlyuchenko had put Russia ahead after a low cross from the right was not dealt with by the Swedish defence and the Russian striker coolly stroke the ball in. Russia never looked like giving up the lead, with Ibrahimovic well marked by Russia.
There were very little chances for Sweden and Henrik Larsson looked lost upfront, but he was darting around smartly and almost looped a header into the net. However, Russia killed the game off in the 2nd half when Arshavin who made a starting appearance, slid in to guide home a Zhirkov's cross to put the scores 2-0 to Russia. As Sweden pushed forward, all that did was to spur Russia onto a counter-offensive where possible and Zyryanov struck the post with 10minutes to go. As the match draws to a close, Russia are going through, and Sweden are going home.
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