Georgia’s happiness and Ukraine’s will: The last participants of the Euro have been announced. National teams of Georgia, Ukraine and Poland advanced to the Euro with the play-offs 27.03.2024, 14:16

Georgia – Greece – 0:0, on penalties – 4-2

The Georgia team managed to reach the final of a major tournament in its 15th attempt. This team was the closest team to qualify for the previous European Championship, but lost 0:1 to North Macedonia in the play-off match and reached the final. The match was then played at the Boris Paichadze Stadium in Tbilisi, but there were no spectators due to Covid restrictions.

This time, Georgian football players again failed to qualify directly and took fourth place among the five teams in qualifying group A. Willy Sagnol’s team beat Cyprus and won two of their eight matches only against the Cypriots. Powerful Spain, Scotland and Norway were ahead.

But at the same time, the Norwegians, who took third place, ended their choice unsuccessfully. Georgia won the play-offs in Group C of the UEFA Nations League sub-group. However, it cannot be said that there are easy opponents other than Gibraltar. Sagnol’s team took revenge convincingly with two wins over Bulgaria and North Macedonia, taking 16 points out of a possible 18.

The Georgian team’s path to the play-offs was also not easy, but it had to play both stages on its home field, which, of course, played an important role. However, the star player of the team, Khvicha Kvaratskhelia from Napoli, could not take part in the semi-final against Luxembourg due to disqualification.

While the home team took the lead with the accurate shot of Budu Zivzivadze from German Karlsruhe, the opponent team equalized in the second half. However, VAR intervened by reviewing the incident that occurred a few minutes ago (there was no stoppage in the game from that moment on). As a result, the goal was canceled and Luxembourg played with 10 men due to the defender being sent off, and Zivzivadze scored the double goal in the remaining time.

Georgia’s opponent in the final match was the experienced national team of Greece. The match was tense as expected; There were fights and constant skirmishes all over the field. Most importantly, they were associated with the harsh game of the Greeks against Kvaratskhelia, who returned to duty.

For example, the elbow of the Greek leader Konstantinos Tsimikas hit Kvaratskhelia in the face, which was not noticed by the referee, after which the Napoli midfielder lay on the grass for several minutes. However, Khvicha caused a clash by sending off Petros Mantalos at the end of the first half, which resulted in substitute Georgian goalkeeper Giorgi Loria receiving a red card for clearing one of the opponents.

During the 90-minute normal period, both teams could only shoot one shot on goal. But in the extra half hour, amid tension and fatigue, the game became much sharper and Tbilisi’s packed crowd of 55,000 saw four scoring chances, two per team.

So the Greeks first hit the crossbar with the efforts of defender Konstantinos Mavropanos, then Lazaros Rota fired a dangerous shot from a good position but just over the goal. On the other hand, Zuriko Davitashvili hit Greek goalkeeper Odysseas Vlachodimos directly from six meters, while Ajax’s striker Georges Mikautadze went out of the advantageous position at the last minute.

Meanwhile, Georgia’s main star was no longer on the field – he was replaced by Kvaratskhelia in the 109th minute due to muscle damage. However, this did not prevent Sagnol’s team from delighting the fans gathered in the stands during the penalty shoot-out.

After Spanish Valencia’s goalkeeper Giorgi Mamardashvili missed the first shot and the team players could not find the goal once again, Georgia qualified for the Euros for the first time in its history. Türkiye will face the Czech Republic and Portugal in Group F.

Ukraine – Iceland – 2:1

In even more dramatic fashion, the Ukrainian team qualified for the European Championship finals. At first, in the qualifying round, only on additional indicators, he lost second place in Group C to the Italian national team, but at the same time, unlike Squadra Azzurra, he once confidently managed to take points from England. took first place.

The Ukrainians were slightly behind the Scots in the League of Nations Group B four, but they gave Ukraine a second chance by qualifying directly for the Euros..

The matches for the national team were even more tense. First, they lost to Bosnia and Herzegovina in the away semi-final until the 85th minute, but thanks to the accurate shots of Roman Yaremchuk and Artem Dovbik, everything managed to turn around at the last moment.

The yellow-blue team was also defeated in the so-called home final against Iceland, which was played at the stadium in Wroclaw, Poland.. In the 54th minute of the second half, Viktor Tsygankov equalized and six minutes before the end of normal time, Mikhail Mudrik from London Chelsea brought his team a ticket to the Euros.

Georgy Sudakov assisted both goals. Interestingly, the attacking midfielder of Shakhtar Donetsk pushed Alexander Zinchenko, who plays for London Arsenal, out of the starting lineup.

In the last part of the continental championship Ukrainians will play in the same lower group with Belgium, Slovakia and Romania.

Wales – Poland – 0:0, on penalties – 4-5

The last Polish team to participate in the European Championship was the Polish team, which could not achieve the Wales target for 120 minutes, but survived the penalty shoot-out and emerged victorious.

Wojciech Szczesny took the first hit from Daniel James and all other fielders from both teams batted accurately.

Poland will compete in Euro Group D, which also includes the Netherlands, France and Austria.