Review of Day 1 at Euro 2012

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An insane opening match to start Euro 2012. At first, it seemed Greece was packing it in without putting any pressure on the ball allowing Poland to wreak all sorts of havoc in the first 20 minutes, allowing Lewondoski to score early on to energize the home crowd. But the lunacy was just beginning.

After a harsh first yellow card on Sokratis Papastathopoulos, a phantom second yellow in the 44th minute of play made it appear as if UEFA had pulled a FIFA in terms of match rigging (the former for one of the co-host countries, the latter for France to qualify for the 2010 World Cup). With Greece looking hapless with 11 men, one only assumed they would look dreadful with 10. However, early in the second half, a mix up between Polish goal keeper Wojciech Szczesny and a defender gave Greek midfielder Dimitris Salpigidis a free chip shot to equalize in stunning fashion. More bizarre turns awaited.

Having just subbed in, Konstantinos Fortounis chipped a brilliant pass over the Polish defense setting up a chance for Salpigidis to add on another tally. His first touch wasn't perfect but Szczesny came off his line, chased the ball, and purposely tripped the attacking player, bringing about an immediate red card and a penalty to Greece. As Ian Darke said, "the match [had] turned on its head." The sub Przemyslaw Tyton came on, said a quick prayer, and went on to save the penalty from the Greek captain Giorgos Karagounis.

With the game ending in a 1-1 draw, both sides believe more could have went their way to get the greatly coveted 3 points in the first match of group play.

The other match saw much less drama, in terms of cards and outcome. For the first 12 minutes or so the Czech had about a vast majority of the possession with Russia looking extremely discombobulated. But they seemingly just needed to get comfortable on Polish soil. They quickly tallied two goals, one by whiz kid Alan Dzagoev, the second by Roman Shirokov, chipping over a seemingly overwhelmed Petr Cech.

Both goals showed an astonishingly lackadaisical Czech back line. With the defense settling in to a uncomfortable wobble, the game slowed to a bit of a crawl. With Vaclav Pilar scoring 7 minutes past halftime, the Czech seemingly had life again. But the chances of an equalizer grew fainter and fainter with each passing minute and in the 79th Dzagoev struck again with authority on a ball Cech could have done better on. Add a final bit of penalty box wizardry by Roman Pavlyuchenko and the Russians had a well deserved 4-1 results, putting them in a commanding position in the group going forward.