Euro 2024 Qualifiers

[Corrode]

it's obvious. Kazakhstan's southwest is caspian sea.

 

[Dave54]

I did my Soviet Military Service there , 85-87, Semipalatinsk. Good people. They had a good team reprsenting Soviet Premiere league. Kairat, Alma Ata.

 

[Dave54]

Btw, a lot of Germans, Poles, Chechnians, Greeks and others were relocated there in Stalin Era.

 

[Dave54]

There was this Greek guy, playing for Pakhtakor, Uzbekistan. They used to call him Greek Maradona. He was that good, Maybe some forum Greeks know about him.

 

[Dave54]

Vasilis Hatzipanagis​

 

[brehme1989]

Btw, a lot of Germans, Poles, Chechnians, Greeks and others were relocated there in Stalin Era.

Stalin was a big fan of rotation

 

[brehme1989]

There was this Greek guy, playing for Pakhtakor, Uzbekistan. They used to call him Greek Maradona. He was that good, Maybe some forum Greeks know about him.

Yeah. Even met him. Still bitter that he wasn't allowed to transfer to a better team or play for the NT (actually our federation fucked up after a point but initially FIFA didn't allow us.

His father was from Cyprus and his mother from Constantinople.

What a player he was...

 

[Dave54]

Stalin was a big fan of rotation

Asshole, really. Destroyed so many lives and families.

 

[brehme1989]

Btw, a lot of Germans, Poles, Chechnians, Greeks and others were relocated there in Stalin Era.

Another Greek player that hails from there is a more recent guy, Dimitris Papadopoulos.
Kazakhstan, not Uzbekistan area like Vasia.

We kinda live in the same town, as long as I'm here that is because I never stick in the same place for more than 3 days lol. Saw him outside a couple of times but never bothered to speak with him.

No idea on his background story, though.

 

[Dave54]

Yeah. Even met him. Still bitter that he wasn't allowed to transfer to a better team or play for the NT (actually our federation fucked up after a point but initially FIFA didn't allow us.

His father was from Cyprus and his mother from Constantinople.

What a player he was...

He got lucky, I guess. Pakhtakor team members all died in an Air Crash in 79.

 

[Dave54]

Another good player for Kairat of Greek origins.
Evstaphiy Pechlevanidis, also known as Yevstafi Alkiviadorovich Pekhlevanidi (Russian: Евстафий Алкивиадорович Пехлеваниди; born 29 October 1960 in Shymkent, Kazakh SSR) is a retired Soviet and Greek professional football player. He is of Caucasus Greek ethnic origin and immigrated from the Soviet Union to Greece in 1990.[1]

 

[Dave54]

Another one, Alexander Khapsalis from Kairat then moved to Dinamo kiev. I used to like him a lot. and it was not easy to get a playing time in Dinamo Kiev those days.
He was fast and good.

 

[IM21]

I am pretty surprised Kazakhstan made a comeback vs Denmark, who were in control of the game, pretty much until the first Kazakstans goal... I am also surprised, Slovenia was able to defeat them at their ground and then played like shit vs San Marino... That group could be very close.

 

[Dave54]

lol, he even played in San Diego at the end. I had no idea.

MISL-Alex Khapsalis

 

[Dave54]

I am pretty surprised Kazakhstan made a comeback vs Denmark, who were in control of the game, pretty much until the first Kazakstans goal... I am also surprised, Slovenia was able to defeat them at their ground and then played like shit vs San Marino... That group could be very close.

Sometimes, Denmark are the biggest chockers out there. Armenia took care of them once in their house 4:0. that was a shocker.

 

[IM21]

Sometimes, Denmark are the biggest chockers out there. Armenia took care of them once in their house 4:0. that was a shocker.

i think that they thought the game was over, when they scored the second and then just wanted to control the game until the end... Still, Denmark, should be the clear favorite in that group, while the next 4 are ranked pretty even in my eyes. Lets see if San Marino can steal a point.

 

[forzainter257]

@Dave54 kudos, you have such a good knowledge about Kazakhstan's football.

as for the Kazakhstan's presense in UEFA, after the collapse of USSR, we were offered to become a member of UEFA since geographically 15% of our territory crosses with European continent, but our then football association thought they stood better chance in Asia in terms of qualifications to big tournaments and decided to join AFC only to find out that beating the corruption at AFC is even harder than qualifying through UEFA. In 2002 we applied to join UEFA, and since then we are playing in this association. Our first ever match as a UEFA member was against Portugal with CR7 being only 17 years old. It's been more than 20 years and you would think everyone has already got used to this fact, but here we are.

Regarding the match against Denmark, not sure about the penalty, our sorry ass TV couldn't catch the incident clearly, so watching at what was presented, it's hard to judge . But the ref should have at least checked it via VAR. The equalizer though was a screamer, Denmark didn't do their homework, cause had they done, they'd have known that Tagybergen has a decent shot from long range and wouldn't have allowed him that space. Anyway, I'm not carried away with this result. We usually make those 1-2 upsets per qualifications but then blow all the remaining games like amateurs.

 

[forzainter257]

Another good player for Kairat of Greek origins.
Evstaphiy Pechlevanidis

I guess he is the best Kazakhstani born greek footballer. I didn't watch him play, but my father did, fans of Kairat used to call him Peha. Apart from footballers with greek origin, we have Ilya Ilyin, a 3 times gold medalist of Olympics in weigtlifting.

 

[Dave54]

I guess he is the best Kazakhstani born greek footballer. I didn't watch him play, but my father did, fans of Kairat used to call him Peha. Apart from footballers with greek origin, we have Ilya Ilyin, a 3 times gold medalist of Olympics in weigtlifting.

Yes. Peha. Well, good old days. I'm sort of Ararat Yerevan fan a and Spartak Moscow fan for life. Grew up in Moscow. there were 5 teams representing the capital in Soviet league, Spartak, Tska ( Red Army), Dinamo Moscow, Torpedo and Locomotiv. A lot of subway fights between Spartak, Red Army and Dinamo fan base. We just hated each other, Torpedo and Locomotive fans were older and wiser and nobody messed with them.

 

[forzainter257]

Yes. Peha. Well, good old days. I'm sort of Ararat Yerevan fan a and Spartak Moscow fan for life. Grew up in Moscow. there were 5 teams representing the capital in Soviet league, Spartak, Tska ( Red Army), Dinamo Moscow, Torpedo and Locomotiv. A lot of subway fights between Spartak, Red Army and Dinamo fan base. We just hated each other, Torpedo and Locomotive fans were older and wiser and nobody messed with them.

Ararat had won the soviet league once iirc. It was quite an achievement in the league where mostly Russian, Ukrainian and Georgian clubs used to dominate.