Roberto was the goalkeeper, with Salino, Cholevas, Manolas and Siovas. Maniatis, Samaris and Dominguez were selected for the midfield. Weiss, Fuster and Mitroglou were fielded in offense.
Benfica entered the pitch with menace; however Olympiacos was quick to bring balance to the match, by keeping possession and creating goal-scoring opportunities.
In 24’, Kostas Mitroglou placed a threat for Artur’s goal. The Greek forward took on the ball, charged face-in, laid it off to his left and took the shot, but Artur made the save to his right corner.
However, it didn’t take much for our Legend to score! Our side’s first-half magic..triad, “Chori”, Mitroglou and Fuster, combined smoothly with Fuster passing to Mitroglou, waiting at the center and inches outside the box. Kostas made the back-heel pass to incoming Dominguez from behind, who controlled the ball and coined a simple, yet splendid dribble past Garay’s slide tackling, and cold-bloodedly slotted into Artur’s net; so, 1-0 in the 29’!
From the goal-scoring moment onwards, the match was particularly balanced, with our Olympiacos being slightly more skillful. The first half ended with our side keeping the 0-1 lead.
In the second half, rain made things more difficult for the players.
However, our side missed a great opportunity to double its lead in 0-2 since in 57’ Maniatis made the through-ball to Fuster, who tipped it upwards, but the ball was held up in the rain-soaked pitch, just half a meter before crossing the goal line!
Finally, Benfica scored the leveller courtesy of Cardoso for 1-1, which was the fixture’s final score, in 83΄ after Luisão’s knock-down following a corner kick.
BENFICA: Artur, Luisão, Cardozo, Lima, John (46’ Cavaleiro), Siqueira, Gaitan (82΄ Rodrigo), Matic, Garay, Almeida, Perez (82΄ Amorim).
OLYMPIACOS: Roberto, Salino, Cholevas, Manolas, Siovas, Samaris, Maniatis, Dominguez (88΄ Medjani), Fuster (69’ Yatabare), Weiss (56’ N’Dinga), Mitroglou.
