The Netherlands, in front of 16,000 noisy fans like 50,000 in Amsterdam, entered the Euro in force by defeating Ukraine 3-2, after a game with a crazy scenario.
The “Oranje”, who are making their comeback in an international tournament, after missing Euro-2016 and the World-2018, share the lead of Group C with Austria, winner of North Macedonia 3-1.
The meeting was presented to TVA Sports.
Frank de Boer’s men will host Austria, again in Amsterdam, for the group’s second day on June 17th.
For an hour, the “Oranje” were dominant: Wijnaldum in midfield and Depay in attack were the spearheads of a solid team sure of its strength. The men of coach Frank de Boer were logically rewarded at the start of the second half by Wijnaldum (52nd) and Weghorst (58th).
Then lightning struck the Johan-Cruyff Arena: in four minutes, Yarmolenko (2-1, 75th) and Yaremchuk (2-2, 79th) overturned the match!
Before Dumfries, one of the great men of the evening, scored a goal jewel of the head (85th), by advancing Zinchenko in the surface, to give a victory after all deserved to his team.
For their entry into the running, the Netherlands delivered an impressive performance for an hour, despite the absence of several major players, including Matthijs de Ligt, the defense boss who is slowly recovering from a groin injury.
Superior in the game, more present in the duels, they entered the match at 100 per hour, and created a good half-dozen chances in the first period.
The man in the first 45 minutes was clearly Ukrainian number 1 Georgiy Bushchan. The Dynamo Kiev goalkeeper first avoided the knockout entry by folding on a shot from Depay in the second minute, before making a high-class reflex save three minutes later against Dumfries.
He then made other decisive outings and saves, in particular on an attempt by Wijnaldum (39th), the Dutch captain in the absence of Virgil van Dijk, injured for several months.
Result: a 0-0 at the break which did not reflect the superiority of the “Oranje”, pushed by 16,000 fans too happy to help give football its popular voice, sadly extinct for more than a year behind closed doors.
Ukraine let go in the opening minutes of the second period. On a block, Dumfries crossed from the penalty spot. Bushchan came out well to repel the ball, but Wijnaldum appeared from far behind the defense to score with a shot from the edge of the area (1-0, 52nd).
Six minutes later, Wout Weghorst resumed opportunistically a ball badly repelled by the defense on an infiltration of Dumfries (2-0, 58th).
In view of the physiognomy of the match, one could believe that the match was folded.
It was counting without the fighting spirit of Andriy Shevchenko’s players. Yarmolenko, the West Ham striker, first reduced the score (75th) with a superb rolled shot from the left foot from about twenty meters. Then Yaremchuk victoriously took over from the head at the penalty spot a free kick well taken by Malinovskyi (79th).
But Dumfries emerged (85th), and gave the Netherlands three valuable points.
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