Ukraine 0-1 Greece: Salpingidis Strike Sends Otto's Men To South Africa

Greece booked their ticket to South Africa after turning over Ukraine in Donetsk in tonight's UEFA World Cup play-off.

Dimitrios Salpingidis' terrific first half strike gave the visitors the goal they needed to secure Greece's place at their first World Cup since 1994.

In his 100th match in charge of the Greek side, coach Otto Rehhagel dropped a bombshell by leaving top scorer Theofanis Gekas on the bench with Euro 2004 hero Angelos Charisteas taking his place up front.

Playing in front of a passionate crowd in the new Donbass Arena, the Yellow-Blues played in a determined fashion in the opening quarter of an hour.

Oleksandr Aliyev was in inspired form and tested Greek 'keeper Tzorvas with an opportunistic shot from inside the box which Shevchenko should have done better with from the rebound.

The Dynamo Kiev man went close again in the 17th minute with a powerful free kick which curled past the Greek wall and was palmed away by Tzorvas.

In a pleasant contrast to the first match in Athens both sides came to play open football and the Greeks had their own chances in the first half.

Dimitrios Salpingidis had the goal at his mercy in the 20th minute but with time and space he lost his footing at the crucial moment and the ball scuffed wide.

Greece were forced to make a change and replaced the injured Sokratis Papastathopoulos with Vassilis Pliatsikas on the half hour mark.

Moments later they stunned the home crowd with a well worked goal and it was Salpingidis who made up for his earlier mistake to punish some slack Ukraine defending.

Giorgios Samaras found himself some space and played in a killer through ball to Salpingidis who timed his run to perfection to slot past Pyatov for only his second international goal with 32 minutes on the clock.

At first the hosts appeared shell shocked to concede in their new venue and the Greeks bossed play for the next few minutes.

With half-time beckoning, the Yellow-Blues almost squared matters after Aliyev delivered another accurate set piece but the Ukraine players only managed to get in each other's way in the ensuing goal mouth scramble and went in a goal down at the break.

Knowing they needed at least two goals to advance to the World Cup finals, Ukraine started the second half brightly and went close through Yeugen who got on the end of a Shevchenko pass but although he was through on goal he fired straight at the 'keeper with a tame effort.

If they were going to get back into the match it was likely to be through a set piece and it was Yaroslav Rakitskyy who forced Tzorvas into an acrobatic stop when he palmed away his rasping free kick in the 57th minute.

The hosts then threw on Yevgen Seleznov and he was in thick of things from the outset.

Moments after coming on he twisted and turned on the edge of the Greek penalty area before firing an effort which just went over the bar.

With the comfort of an away goal, Rehhagel sent on the surprisingly dropped Theofanis Gekas for the final 25 minutes. The hitman had a chance to secure matters with ten minutes remaining when he raced onto a through ball only to fall over when he attempted to turn inside a chasing yellow shirt.

Playing for their World Cup lives, Ukraine pushed men forward and left gaps at the back as they tried to break down a solid Greek defence.

At times in the second half there were as many as ten white shirts in the Ukraine half and Shevchenko was forced to drop deep to get onto the ball.

Ukraine found it hard to create any clear cut opportunities in the second 45 as the Greeks took the fizz out of the game. They had half hearted appeals for a penalty waved away as Artem Milevskiy went to ground in the closing stages.

With only moments remaining, Shevchenko fed in Tymoschuk from the right hand side but the Bayern man shot well wide with a poor attempt.

Greece held on valiantly for the remainder to secure King Otto's charges a bite at the World Cup cherry for the first time in sixteen years.

Patrick Reilly, Goal.com