This is not how the Red Devils had imagined their revenge for their early elimination (from the group stage) at the 2022 World Cup. Domenico Tedesco’s players got off to a very bad start to this Euro 2024 by losing to at Slovakia this Monday (0-1), their first defeat since Qatar. Romelu Lukaku was denied two goals in this meeting.
The match: 0-1
The Belgians, however, entered the match very quickly, like Lukaku’s missed opportunity against the goals (2nd). It was in their highlight of the first ten minutes that Slovakia surprised Belgium by opening the scoring after a big error from Jérémy Doku.
After two very good actions where the Manchester City player was on the initiative, Doku made a mistake on his recovery, very close to his area, by putting the ball in the axis. After a first save from Belgian goalkeeper Koen Casteels, Slovak striker Ivan Schranz took the ball very well to deceive the Belgian goalkeeper this time. It had been three years since the Slavia Prague player had scored for the national team.
Shortly after opening the score, the Belgians lost their footing and the surprising Slovakia was able to impose its game and press its opponent. The offensive players, with the exception of Doku who remained in his match despite his mistake on the Slovak goal, were very little in sight. Leandro Trossard, released in the 74th minute, did not endanger the Slovak defense, with only three shots on goal, only one of which was on target. Clumsy, Lukaku missed several opportunities like the loss of his face-to-face with the Slovak goalkeeper (42nd).
At the start of the second half, the Red Devils pushed harder and set the Slovak area on fire more than once. Lukaku had even thought of scoring the equalizing goal twice (56th, 86th), ultimately refused respectively for offside and handball. But Francesco Calzona’s men held on until the end to keep their evening opponent in check, while the Belgians showed physical shortcomings in the second part of the second half.
The fact: two goals denied to Lukaku
This Monday evening, VAR logically refused two goals from Romelu Lukaku. The 31-year-old striker, already the author of several missed opportunities, was also frustrated by the video refereeing. He was first denied a first goal (56th), for an obvious offside. Then a breakthrough from the incoming Lois Openda which allowed Lukaku to serve was at the origin of the liberating goal. Finally, the referee was alerted by the VAR of a hand, light but very present, from Openda when controlling his ball.
