The 2024-25 Nations League season starts for Finland on Saturday, when Markku Kanerva takes his team to Piraeus' Georgios Karaiskakis. The opponent is the 2004 European champion Greece, who has plowed well in deep waters at times. However, the Hellenes may now have slightly better times ahead of them and the goal would be to reach the prestigious championships for the first time since the 2014 World Championships.

Like Finland, Greece was also in the EC further qualifiers in the spring, when at that time the team led by Gus Poyet had reached the further qualifiers through the C-League of the Nations League. However, there was no place in the competition, when Georgia beat the Hellenes in a tough competition in the further qualifying final. Now Greece is progressing under the guidance of ex-Panathinaikos coach Igor Jovanovic, and the job will get tougher, at least on the side of the Nations League, in one go, when in the B-League group, in addition to Finland and Ireland, England will also have to be knocked down, to get significant benefits that promote a place in the competition.

Notable absentees for Greece in this window are Central Defender Panos Retsos, George Baldock and Zeca. The roster is mostly strong, however, and players like Kostas Tsimikas, Vangelis Pavlidis and Odysseas Vlachodimos are sure to challenge Finland. At least Finland has to wrestle with Benfica's Pavlidis all evening in defense!

On paper, Greece have a supremacy in player market value of 180 million to 40 million eur, and of course they are favourites, but how big? The recent home games do not give good benchmark? Or New Zealand perhaps? Greece won 2-0.

In 2026, 16 teams from Europe will be admitted to the World Cup, which means that Finland's chances for the final tournament will also improve slightly, but Kanerva's team still has a long and rocky road ahead. The path to the League of Nations seems difficult, when England, according to all logic, will win the group from here. However, to be honest, nothing suggests that Finland would take the top spot in this group - this is the cold reality.

For the first time, the Finnish team has Adam Ståhl, Santeri Haarala, and Topi Keskinen. From this trio, Ståhl can even be in the opener as a real team when Nikolai Alho is in the hospital. Other injury absences include Daniel Håkans and Marcus Forss. It will be interesting to see again if Kanerva trusts in a line of four or if the formation of three central defenders will be implemented.

Kanerva got a new contract surprisingly after a poor few years, and now he has to be fresher, wiser, and more courageous if he still wants to stay. With the few new faces—especially Ståhl from Djurgarden and Keskinen from Aberdeen—there are some new elements Finland has lacked. We will see how it goes!

Greece's odds have been pushed down all week, but given the poor performances for some years, Greece home advantage and the superiority of the strong individuals of Greece I have to for a clear home win. The Finnish team lack class in every department, especially central defense, and it showed in the matches v Slovenia and Wales.

芬兰的2024-25赛季国家联赛将于周六开始，届时马尔库·卡内瓦将带领他的球队前往比雷埃夫斯的乔治奥斯·卡拉斯卡基斯。其对手是2004年欧洲杯冠军希腊队，后者有时在深水区表现出色。然而，希腊人现在可能有更好的时间，他们的目标是自2014年世界锦标赛以来首次进入久负盛名的锦标赛。

和芬兰一样，希腊也参加了春季欧共体的进一步预选赛，当时由格斯·波耶特率领的球队已经通过国际联赛的c联赛进入了进一步预选赛。然而，格鲁吉亚队在资格赛的决赛中击败了希腊队，并没有在比赛中获得一席之地。如今，希腊在前帕纳辛纳科斯主教练伊戈尔·约万诺维奇(Igor Jovanovic)的指导下取得了进步，而这项工作将变得更加艰难，至少在国家联赛方面是这样，当在b联赛组中，除了芬兰和爱尔兰之外，英格兰也必须被击败，才能获得显著的优势，从而在比赛中获得一席之地。

值得注意的是，在这个转会窗口缺席的希腊球员有中卫帕诺斯·雷特索斯、乔治·巴尔多克和泽卡。然而，球队的阵容大多很强大，像科斯塔斯·齐米卡斯、范吉利斯·帕夫利迪斯和奥德海斯·弗拉乔迪莫斯这样的球员肯定会挑战芬兰队。至少芬兰队整个晚上都要和本菲卡队的帕夫利迪斯在防守上角力!

纸面上，希腊的球员市场价值在1.8亿到4000万欧元之间，他们当然是最受欢迎的球队，但有多大呢?最近的主场比赛没有给出好的基准吗?或者是新西兰?希腊以2比0获胜。

2026年，16支欧洲球队将被允许参加世界杯，这意味着芬兰进入决赛的机会也会略有提高，但卡内瓦的球队仍有漫长而艰难的道路要走。通往国际联盟的道路似乎很艰难，根据所有的逻辑，英格兰将从这里赢得小组冠军。然而，说实话，没有任何迹象表明芬兰队会成为小组头名——这是冷酷的现实。

芬兰队第一次有了亚当·斯塔特尔、桑特里·哈拉拉和托皮·凯斯基宁。在这三人组中，当尼古拉·阿尔霍住院时，斯塔马尔甚至可以作为一支真正的球队出现在揭幕战中。其他因伤缺阵的还有丹尼尔·哈斯坎斯和马库斯·福斯。卡内尔瓦是相信四人阵型，还是采用三中卫阵型，这将是一件有趣的事情。

卡内尔瓦在糟糕的几年之后出人意料地得到了一份新合同，现在如果他还想留下来，他必须变得更新鲜、更聪明、更勇敢。随着这几张新面孔的出现，尤其是来自尤尔加登的斯塔马尔和来自阿伯丁的凯斯基宁，芬兰缺少了一些新元素。我们将拭目以待!

希腊的赔率整个星期都在下降，但考虑到希腊几年来的糟糕表现，希腊的主场优势和希腊强大的个人优势，我必须为一个明显的主场胜利。芬兰队在各个方面都缺乏水准，尤其是中卫，这在与斯洛文尼亚和威尔士的比赛中表现得淋漓尽致。