Euro 2024: Spain takes on Georgia and advances to the quarter-finals

By opening the score and playing its few shots to the fullest, Georgia sold its skin dearly but the Spanish ogre finally made short work of it (4-1), Sunday, in the round of 16 of the Euro 2024 in Cologne. Thanks to this controlled success, La Roja wins the right to challenge next Friday in Stuttgart, in the quarter-final, the German hosts who beat Denmark on Saturday (2-0).

Fifty minutes is roughly how long the Georgians’ crazy dream lasted in the first round of 16 of their first major international competition. But Luis de la Fuente’s men confirmed the excellent impression left in the first round, with a well-oiled game which, without neglecting the preparation phases, seeks to really hurt the opponent without superfluous convolutions. We can barely blame them for their lack of efficiency (36 shots, 13 on target), like Lamine Yamal’s multiple wastes in the second half.

While everyone expects to see him beat the record for the earliest scorer in a Euro, held by the Swiss Johan Vonlanthen, scorer against France at Euro 2004 at 18 years and 141 days, he still has to wait . Although he is only 16 years and 11 months old (he will be 17 on July 13, the day before the final), he only has three matches at best to make history.

The Norman is holed

In any case, this did not prevent his teammates from recovering from an opening goal, obviously against the run of play, but which gave all the salt to this meeting. On the first Georgian incursion beyond the halfway line, after a nice delay in the middle of the field, Georges Mikautadze shifted the full-back Otar Kakabadze, who swallowed up all the space left free on the right before crossing. Under the threat of Khvicha Kvaratskhelia, Robin Le Normand procrastinated and finally put his hip to deflect the fleeing ball flush with the left post of Unai Simon (0-1, 18th), triggering the jubilation of the stadium mostly committed to the cause of ” Crusaders.”

But apart from an attempt from midfield by Kvaratskhelia (48th) which Unai Simon, much too advanced, was very happy to see go wide, Georgia suffered the law of a team which had already inflicted a 7-1 and a 3-1 on them in the qualifiers.

Despite 9 more saves from Giorgi Mamardashvili, the match often resembled handball, as the White and Red defence was huddled in its last 25 metres. An understandable strategy but doomed to failure given the quality of the Spanish passes, vision and movements.

The Spanish bench exults

The equaliser thus came at the end of a fairly long sequence of play where Nico Williams found Rodri with a brilliant low pass, alone in the centre, and whose low cross shot was unstoppable (1-1, 39th). The explosive reaction of the Spanish bench, most of whose players found themselves on the pitch, showed the relief that an equaliser before the break had given them. Conversely, several Georgian players fell prostrate on the pitch, as if they knew what was coming next.

When Fabian Ruiz, totally isolated at the far post, smashed a center from Yamal with a header too powerful for Mamardashvili, still on the trajectory (2-1, 51st), the mass was said.

With two days less rest than their opponents, after their exploit against Portugal (2-0), Willy Sagnol’s men gave everything they had left in the tank, but in vain. They well deserved the ovation from their supporters at the final whistle, and probably also from a few Spaniards.

But Williams and Dani Olmo showed off their technique in movement, their lucidity and the quality of their shots to give more scope to the Spanish victory (3-1, 75th and 4-1, 83rd) and probably nightmares to the German supporters.

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