European Football Championship 2024: 18 yellows, two reds: The Hamburg card festival

It was done: When the entire Turkish European Championship delegation lined up around the center circle of Hamburg’s Volksparkstadion after the 2-1 victory over the Czech Republic on Wednesday evening and celebrated their place in the round of 16 while jumping to the cheers of tens of thousands of Turkey fans, something historic had been achieved, like the coach Vincenzo Montella emphasized after breaking away from the crowd of cheers on the pitch: “We made history today. “Turkey has reached the round of 16 after failing to do so three times before,” he announced to the assembled press. »I am very happy and very proud of my players.«

The final game of Group F had historical significance in several respects: On the one hand, the 36th match of this tournament marked the end of the European Championship group phase. All the dice have been cast, all round of 16 games have been decided (see schedule on page 15). On the other hand, the less confident Romanian referee István Kovács gave the game even more records: he showed the yellow card 18 times, so many had never been seen in a European Championship game before. In addition, there were two reds.

Record quick dismissal

But that’s not all: Referee Kovács made a kind of preliminary decision in the 20th minute when he reduced the initially pressing Czech team to a ten: The Romanian sent along the Czech attacker Antonín Barák, who had already been warned for holding his jersey, after his second foul Yellow-red from the pitch for a kick that should under no circumstances have had such drastic consequences.

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This whistle was also an act of historical significance: the 29-year-old from AC Fiorentina, who from then on had to watch the self-sacrificing fight of his teammates from the bench, now holds the questionable record of the fastest dismissal since the first European Football Championship was held in 1960.

In Match 36, some of the important trends from this 17th European Championship became clear once again: for example, goals in stoppage time. There were ten goals in this tournament after the regular 90 minutes had ended, more than ever before. In Hamburg, the final goal on the match report was 90+4: Substitute Cenk Tosun, 33, born in Wetzlar, scored the decisive goal to make it 2-1 after a nice individual performance, which secured the Turks second place in the group and the Czech Republic Out gave.

The Czechs’ numerical inferiority on the field made most of the 50,000 spectators in the Hamburg Arena rejoice after the 20th minute. But the overwhelming majority of Turkish fans almost despaired: the Montanella troops didn’t know what to do with either the preponderance of players or the quasi-home advantage. On the contrary: the Turkish central defense Merih Demiral/Samet Akaydin remained constantly shaky and disorganized during the few Czech counterattacks even after yellow-red. At the front, the Turkish attackers got stuck in the opposing defense.

Coach Montanella relied on the youngsters, like so many coaches at this European Championship. Young players in particular (Lamin Yamal, 16, Spain) and particularly old players (Pepe, Portugal, 41) are making their mark on this tournament. The Turkish winger on Wednesday consisted of two 19-year-olds, Kenan Yıldız from Juventus on the left and Real Madrid star Arda Güler on the right. They were supposed to organize the game with captain Hakan Çalhanoğlu (30).

But it was only after the break that these experts were able to break through the Czech Republic’s defense. Former HSV player Çalhanoğlu made it 1-0 with a tight shot from the half-left position (51′), which Czech Republic’s outstanding captain Tomáš Souček equalized with a follow-up shot just a quarter of an hour later after a long throw-in from Vladimír Coufal.

Suddenly even pressing

After the 1-1 draw in the 66th minute, the Czech Republic suddenly even played pressing, with one player less. Wrong world. Czech Republic goalkeeper Matěj Kovář ran up to 30 meters into the field when they had the ball and then played long crosses to the strikers, while the Turks only cautiously tried to turn more possession into an advantage. They acted too clumsily, knowing that a draw would certainly be enough for the round of 16.

Both coaches substituted whatever the bench had to offer, both teams received a ton of warnings – the Czech Republic ended up with eleven, Turkey seven. Of all things, the highly praised captain’s rule, which has already saved the spectators at this European Championship tournament several minutes of complaining because only the captains are allowed to discuss with the referee, caused the record flood in this match. Referee István Kovács warned everyone who twitched, including every complainer on the bench, which in turn made the players and coaches even more heated. When Kovács finally blew the final whistle, Czech Republic striker Tomáš Chorý received a red card for arguing with the cheering Turks. The attacker from FK Viktoria Plzeň didn’t care, his team was eliminated and the Turks are in the round of 16 against Austria.

Until the wild clash between the Czechs and Turks, there had only been one red card in the first part of the European Championship – for Scot Ryan Porteous, who fouled DFB captain İlkay Gündoğan in the opening game. This EM trend may not continue. From now on, every game is all or nothing. Only the European champion makes it into the history books.

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