The winners and losers of the first matchday will face each other on Saturday. Portugal and Turkey will duel it out to win the group, while Georgia and the Czech Republic will fight to catch up.
22.06.2024, 05:00
22.06.2024, 09:19
SDA
Turkey recently failed to reach the group stage of the European Championship twice in a row. In Germany, Italian coach Vincenzo Montella's team took the first step towards ensuring that things will be different this time and that the Turks will still be there when the knockout phase begins.
The 3:1 victory over Georgia, cheered on by tens of thousands of Turkish fans in Dortmund, was a dream start peppered with dream goals. Mert Müldür scored with a powerful volley in the first half and Arda Güler, the 19-year-old super talent from Real Madrid, showed his class after just over an hour with a beautiful shot into the corner of the goal.
The Turks now face another clash with Portugal in Dortmund on Saturday (18:00). The 2016 European champions have made a less than convincing start to the tournament. Cristiano Ronaldo's team trailed against the stubborn Czechs until the 69th minute, before an own goal and a goal from Francisco Conceição, who had come on as a substitute shortly beforehand, turned the game around in stoppage time to make it 2-1.
Meanwhile, Georgia and the Czech Republic will try to take advantage of a possible defeat of one of the favorites in the afternoon match (starting at 3 p.m.) and put themselves back in position for a place in the round of 16.
At 9 p.m. in Cologne, two teams that could not have started the tournament in more different ways will play each other. On the one hand, the Romanians, who are already in a slightly euphoric mood after their 3-0 win over Ukraine, and on the other, the Belgians, who are once again confronted with the fear of failing early at a major tournament with great expectations after their 1-0 defeat against Slovakia.
