Teenager Ninis left out by Greece for Hungary friendly

ATHENS, May 20 (Reuters) - Greece coach Otto Rehhagel has left teenage midfielder Sotiris Ninis out of his 24-man squad to play Hungary in Saturday's Budapest friendly, the Greek FA said.

The 18-year-old became the country's youngest scorer on Monday with the opener against Cyprus after five minutes of his debut before being substituted at halftime in the 2-0 win.

However, with a number of regulars returning to the squad after missing the Cyprus game through club commitments, Ninis has returned to the sidelines.

His absence from the squad announced on Tuesday means he is only likely to be called up for Euro 2008 if the European champions suffer an injury ahead of the June tournament.

AEK Athens central defender Socratis Papastathopoulos has retained his place in the squad and has a final chance to nail down a place in the final 23.

Rehhagel is expected to announce his Euro 2008 squad shortly after the match in Hungary because the team will then leave for a pre-tournament training camp in Germany from May 25-June 1.

Squad:

Goalkeepers: Antonis Nikopolidis (Olympiakos Piraeus) Costas Chalkias (Aris Salonika), Alexandros Tzorvas (OFI Crete)

Defenders: Nikos Spyropoulos, Loukas Vintra, Ioannis Goumas (all Panathinaikos), Paraskevas Antzas, Vassilis Torossidis Christos Patsatzoglou (all Olympiakos), Traianos Dellas, Socratis Papastathopoulos (both AEK Athens), Giourkas Seitaridis (Atletico Madrid), Sotiris Kyrgiakos (Eintracht Frankfurt).

Midfielders: Angelos Basinas (Mallorca) Giorgos Karagounis, Alexandros Tziolis (both Panathinaikos), Stelios Giannakopoulos (Bolton Wanderers), Costas Katsouranis (Benfica).

Forwards: Angelos Charisteas (Nurnberg), Fanis Gekas (Bayer Leverkusen), Giorgos Samaras (Celtic), Dimitris Salpigidis (Panathinaikos), Nikos Liberopoulos (AEK), Ioannis Amanatidis (Eintracht Frankfurt)

(Reporting by Barney Spender, editing by Karolos Grohmann)