Manchester United went ahead through Cristiano Ronaldo's magnificent header, but Arsenal's Stylianos Yannakopoulos was not to be denied and saved Arsenal a point with his 17th goal of the season.
Barcelona are through to the Champions League semifinals thanks to another famous display of their Greek midfielder Yorgos Karagounis, who marked Bayern's Michael Ballack out of the game and then picked up the winner himself in the 87th minute.
Juventus have clinched the Italian title by beating Milan by 2-1 in the Serie A decider. Angelos Charisteas was on target twice for the Turin team before winning a penalty for Juve, but Pavel Nedved's shot was well-saved by Milan's keeper Antonis Nikopolidis.
Finally, Celtic's Traianos Dellas annihilated Dado Prso in the Old Firm derby, but Zizis Vryzas in Rangers' attack proved elusive yet again equalizing five minutes from time. Noticed any mistakes in this "news from the future?" Yes, here it is: none of the current Greek heroes will ever play a major role at a major European club.
If the members of the European championship winning team were such great individual players, then they would be all over Real Madrid, Manchester United, Juventus, Bayern, Porto, or at least Ajax, Lyon or Rangers.
If any of them were so good, then Roman Abramovich would have been drooling over them for a long time, Alex Ferguson would have tried to snatch a couple of them from Serie A giants, and Real Madrid's presidential candidates would have signed another as an election trump card like Florentino Perez did with Luis Figo in 2000.
OK, it is always possible that all the coaches in the world are silly old ignorants who failed to notice the Greeks' true value before Otto Rehhagel stepped in. But, not even that would be a good explanation of the Greek phenomenon, for if they were truly big, then Panathinaikos and Olympiakos would have been tough rivals for Madrid, Milan or Valencia in recent European club cups' finals.
As it happens, only Panathinaikos has made the final of a European cup competition losing 2-0 to Ajax in the European Cup final in 1971, and the last semifinalists were Panathinaikos again eight years ago.
Then how on earth did Greece end up winning Euro 2004, one of the most prestigious trophies in world sports, in the face of France, England, Italy, Holland, Spain or Portugal? And not only win it, but also deserved it, at least in the narrow legal sense of the word.
Greece deserved to win because they did not steal anything from anybody, except perhaps for the spirit of the game. They did not score illegal goals, they were not unduly spared of red cards, or handed non-existing penalties in their favour.
The only refereeing mistake against one of Greece's opponents was the non-award of penalty on Czech Republic's Jan Koller in the semifinals.
So Greece won the Cup deservedly, but how did it come to this, if its players are so ordinary? Many factors conspired to make happen what many have called "the biggest upset in soccer history".
Of course, the Greek players are not bad either. All of them are, or were, big stars in the Greek domestic league, and many have taken part in the Champions' League with Olympiakos, Panathinaikos or AEK. But, those playing in the homeland had a less busy schedule compared to their foreign colleagues in England, Spain, Germany or Italy.
The Greek league may be very passionate and dramatic, but not at all equally demanding as the Premiership, or even the French Le Championnat. Most of those playing abroad had not been used all that much. Charisteas started only seven times in the Bundesliga. Key defender Dellas only appeared in 30 games in the past three seasons. Yannakopoulos had injury problems at Bolton and was not used all that much. Nikolaidis, a gargantuan figure at AEK, failed to set Atletico Madrid on fire. Vryzas, once a first choice forward for Perugia, was sold to then Serie B Fiorentina in January.
There is only so much effort that a professional footballer can sustain, and the players in the biggest clubs like Arsenal, Manchester United, Real Madrid, Valencia, Juventus, Milan and many others simply had been drained more than their Greek counterparts.
Then, there is the issue of the coach. Otto Rehhagel, far from being a defensive-minded type, did the most with the material available to him. The supremely experienced man who made provincial Werder and Kaiserslautern German champions, once again excelled at creating a competitive team against all odds.
He selected the system based on the players he had and not vice versa, and then he drilled the players ad nauseam to achieve the maximum automation of movement. The credit also goes to the Greek FA (EPO), which gave Rehhagel free rein to act as he saw fit, when they could so easily have interfered and made his work impossible.
So, the Greek team was composed of fresher players and coached by a wise, serious and hard-working soccer wizard (a father figure!), fully supported by the Federation.
But, none of this would have been enough for the "biggest upset in soccer history" if one chief ingredient had been lacking: the fanatical patriotism of the Greeks! Of all 16 teams that took part in Euro 2004 the Greeks come from the most patriotically minded nation, and on top of that Rehhagel brought to Portugal an ethnically pure team.
While so many internationals in other teams were naturalized, descendants of immigrants or originally from former colonies, Greece had a squad representing their homeland in every sense: a true national team.
Many have overlooked that factor and may even consider this argument out of place, but it should be remembered that Greece is not a melting pot like most countries of Western Europe, and that the national identity, cultural heritage and linguistical uniformity define an average Greek far more than they do citizens of most other European nations.
Of course the feverish patriotism of the Greeks has not done the country much good elsewhere, but it is sports we are talking about, and spectator sports are the best and the most widely accepted surrogate for war.
Fuelled by the desire to glorify their homeland and to make their fellow countrymen around the world proud, the footballers from Hellas were just a little bit stronger, quicker, moreresistant and determined than their opponents. While they will always have that edge over the others, the question is whether the remaining factors that conspired to transform them into champions will remain in the future.
Greece World Cup 2010 Team Profile