Oranje falls to Austria 3-2, but still advances despite third place group finish
Oranje lost their final group game of Euro 2024 against Austria in the Olympiastadion in Berlin on Tuesday. Ronald Koeman's side were beaten 3-2 by the Austrians. They finished third but still advanced to the next round as one of the best third-placed teams. Austria finished top of the group, with France finishing as runners-up.
Oranje made a terrible start, going a goal down within seven minutes. It is the third earliest goal that Oranje has conceded at a major tournament. Alexander Prass played a low cross into the box, which was slid into the goal by Oranje attacker Donyell Malen, who scored the seventh own goal of the tournament.
Malen had the most significant chance of the half for Oranje to make up for his mistake when Tijjani Reijnders played him in, but the forward rolled his shot wide after 23 minutes.
Koeman's side was inches away from going into halftime with a scoreline of 1-1. Cody Gakpo crossed the ball into the box to Memphis Depay, whose lobbed header hit the post.,
The Dutch made a perfect start to the second half, leveling the scores after just a minute. Former Ajax midfielder Florian Grillitsch lost the ball in midfield to Lutsharel Geertruida, which started a counterattack. It resulted in Cody Gakpo getting his second goal of the tournament with a hard-driven effort into the far corner.
They went behind again in the 59th minute. Grillitsch made up for his mistake by putting in a perfect cross for Romano Schmid to head home via the legs of Netherlands defender Stefan de Vrij.
It was an exciting game that swung back and forth, with both teams attacking. The Netherlands equalized again in the 75th minute. Wout Weghorst proved his worth from the substitutes' bench once more, having already scored the winner in the first game against Poland, by setting up Depay for his first goal in the tournament. The tall striker headed the ball down to Depay, who volleyed it home perfectly. The goal was initially ruled out for handball, but replays showed that this was not the case.
Yet again, the Dutch defence could not hang on as Austria went ahead again within minutes. Christoph Baumgartner played the ball to Marcel Sabitzer, who smashed it into the top corner from an acute angle with his weaker foot.
Weghorst could have scored his second goal of the tournament in the 86th minute, but his flying header went over the bar.
This resulted in the match finishing 3-2 to Austria, who finished top of the group. France was held by Poland in a 1-1 draw, meaning that the Netherlands and France both finished the group with just one win each.
The Netherlands could potentially play the Group C winner at 6 p.m. on Sunday, Spain at 9 p.m. on Sunday, or the Group E winner on July 2 at 6 p.m. Currently, England is at the top of Group C with four points, ahead of Denmark and Slovenia which each have two points with a match left to play.
Currently, Romania leads Group E, but that situation is also tense as each team has won a match and lost a match. The Romanians are tied on points with Belgium, Slovakia and Ukraine with one match left to play.
