Greece v Russia

UEFA EURO 2008 GROUP D
Date: Sat 14 June KO: 1945 BST Venue: Stadion Wals-Siezenheim, Salzburg
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Rehhagel is expected to make some changes to his Greece side
Greece look set to make changes to their 5-3-2 formation as their look to bounce back from defeat against Sweden and get their Euro campaign on track.

Yannis Amanatidis or Nikos Liberopoulos could start as a third striker, meaning no place for stopper Paraskevas Antzas.

Russia's struggling striker Roman Pavlyuchenko returned to training on Friday and could play.

Pavlyuchenko, who injured his thigh against Spain, was missing from a practice session on Thursday.

He appeared to be moving freely during the part of training open to the media on Friday and coach Guus Hiddink said he would make a decision over his fitness on Saturday.


Meanwhile, Manchester City striker Georgios Samaras could again find himself on the bench for defending champions Greece.

Defeat for either side would end their hopes of qualifying for the quarter-finals.


BIG MATCH STATS
Head-to-heads

This match features the winners of the first European Championship (Russia) against the winners of the last European Championship (Greece).

These nations have met on 19 previous occasions with Russia winning 12 times and Greece three. Russia have defeated Greece nine times in 13 competitive matches. Greece have won three times.

Their most recent meeting was at Euro 2004 with Russia emerging victorious 2-1. Dmitri Kirichenko scored the fastest goal in European Championship history after 75 seconds and Dmitri Bulykin made it 2-0. Zisis Vryzas scored for Greece in their only defeat at Euro 2004.

Head to head records and significant meetings
Team facts - Greece

Defeat against Sweden marks only the second time in the European Championships that the defending champions started their title defence with a loss. In 1980, West Germany defeated champions Czechoslovakia 1-0.

No nation has ever retained the European Championship title and only one nation has won the crown in spite of a defeat in their first match (Netherlands in 1988). In two of the last three European Championships the defending champions have not made it past the group phase.

How champions have fared in their defence of the European Championship trophy


Team facts - Russia

Tuesday's 4-1 defeat to Spain was Russia's heaviest loss in European Championship history. Russia had also lost three matches in the competition by 3-0.

Coach Guus Hiddink is in charge at his fifth European Championship or World Cup. Only West Germany head coach Helmut Schon was present at more European Championships and World Cups. Hiddink has also become the first head coach to lead two different countries at the European Championship. He was the head coach of the Netherlands in 1996. In that year, he led Holland to the quarter-finals in spite of losing a group match to England 4-1.

This is the fifth European Championship match in which both nations are led by a foreign coach and the only one in the Euro 2008 group phase.

Player facts - Greece

In the opening match, Giorgios Seitaridis picked up his fourth yellow card in the competition, which leaves him one shy of the record held by Gheorghe Hagi, Pavel Nedved and Gianluca Zambrotta. Team mate Giorgios Karagounis is also on four yellow cards at European Championships.

Seitaridis, Vassilis Torosidis and Angelos Charisteas will be suspended for the final group match if they receive a yellow card against Russia.

Player facts - Russia

Andrei Arshavin is suspended for this fixture after being sent off in Russia's final qualification game, a 1-0 win against Andorra. This is the second of his two-match ban.

Russia have only one player in their squad who plays outside the country's domestic league - 1. FC Nurnberg striker Ivan Saenko. No other country at Euro 2008 has so many players from their own domestic competition. If selected, Saenko will run into club team mate Angelos Charisteas.