Unbelievable Moments and Records: Turkey’s Victory and More in the Euro Cup Round of 16

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The last match of the Euro Cup round of 16 started off with a bang at the Leipzig Stadium, as Turkey scored the second-fastest goal in the history of the competition in their 2-1 victory over Austria in a tie that determined the Netherlands’ opponent in the quarterfinals, which will be played this Saturday at 4pm at the Olympic Stadium in Berlin.

The Rising Stars overwhelmed their opponents in the opening seconds and earned a corner right from the start of the match in the German state of Saxony. The man charged with saving the ball was Real Madrid star Arda Güler, who sent a tight cross into the area that was blocked off the line by midfielder Christoph Baumgartner, bounced off his teammate Stefan Posch and the trajectory of the ball forced a hesitant response from Austrian goalkeeper Patrick Pentz.

The fatal blunder was crowned when the ball was left floating and the defender, Merih Demiral, who had been waiting for the play, took a powerful left-footed shot with the necessary height to overcome the height of the opposing men who had remained under the three posts. The shot crashed into the net to mark 1-0 at 56 seconds, as shown by the official broadcast on its stopwatch.

This is the second-earliest goal ever scored, behind only Nedim Bajrami’s goal for Albania against Italy in Dortmund, which came after 23 seconds. The podium is completed by Russia’s Dmitri Kirichenko against Greece in 2004 (1 minute and 7 seconds). Next in line are Belgium’s Youri Tielemans against Romania this year (1 minute and 13 seconds), Sweden’s Emil Forsberg against Poland in 2021 (1 minute and 22 seconds) and Georgia’s Khvicha Kvaratskhelia’s goal against Portugal in Group F of the current competition (1 minute and 32 seconds).

This Euro has been marked by records because, beyond the fact that four of the six fastest goals took place in 2024, the Portuguese Pepe also became the oldest player to play in the tournament (41 years and 126 days), the Croatian Luka Modrić is the oldest player to score at least one goal (38 years and 289 days) and the Spaniard Lamine Yamal is the youngest to play in a Euro (16 years and 338 days), according to the official UEFA website.

* Demiral’s save to prevent Austria from equalising

After Turkey’s 1-0 in Leipzig, Austria’s response was only a matter of time in the game, as another unusual move took place four minutes in. Romano Schmid followed Güler’s example with a corner that went wide of Fehmi Mert Günok’s goal. The ball flew past the goalkeeper and Demiral emerged from the shadows at the far post to deny Christoph Baumgartner a penalty. The ball missed the net by centimetres and went out of bounds just outside the left post.

It should be noted that Turkey reached this stage after qualifying second in Group F with six points, behind Portugal, which had the same number of points and occupied that place thanks to the victory in the direct match between the two, and ahead of Georgia (4) and the Czech Republic (1). On the other hand, Austria led Group D with six points, surpassing France (5), the Netherlands (4) and Poland (1).

The Euro quarter-finals will begin on Friday at 1pm (Argentine time) with Spain-Germany, while Portugal-France will play in the last round starting at 4pm. On Saturday, England will face Switzerland (1pm) and the Netherlands will face Turkey (4pm).

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2024-07-02 22:03:00
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