Belgium v Romania LIVE: Euro 2024 result and final score as Kevin De Bruyne goal seals crucial Group E win
Belgium 2-0 Romania: The Red Devils picked up their first points of Euro 2024 as Youri Tielemens struck inside two minutes before De Bruyne wrapped up victory
Belgium got their Euro 2024 campaign back on track after an impressive 2-0 win against Romania, with goals from Youri Tielemans and Kevin De Bruyne enough to take the points and leave Group E wide open.
Romelu Lukaku was the architect of the first Belgian goal and teed Tielemans up perfectly to fire home a superb effort from just inside the area in the second minute.
De Bruyne had chances throughout a polished Belgian performance and doubled the lead with 10 minutes left when he latched on to a long ball from goalkeeper Koen Casteels and found the net from seven metres out.
The result leaves all four teams in Group E on three points going into the Wednesday’s final matches, when Belgium take on Ukraine and Romania face Slovakia.
Euro 2024: Turkey v Portugal
Head-to-head
Portugal ans Turkey have met a total of nine times, with Turkey winning just two and Portugal winning the other seven.
Remarkably, three of their previous meetings have come in European Championship matches.
Portugal won 1-0 at the group stage phase at Euro ‘96, and then won 2-0 at the quarter-finals of Euro 2000.
The next game between the two sides came at Euro 2008, when Pepe and Raul Meireles scored in a 2-0 group-stage win.
Turkey last beat Portugal in a friendly in 2012, when a Pepe own goal contributed to a 3-1 win.
Brawls, biblical rain and wonder goals: How Turkey vs Georgia turned Euro 2024 upside down
Here’s the match report from Turkey’s opening game.
You’d be forgiven for having earmarked Turkey vs Georgia as the most low-key fixture of the Euro 2024 group stage. After all, the combined ranking of the teams was the most modest at the tournament so far, and Georgia entered Group F with no European Championship experience to their name. This game, though? It turned into something far beyond a football match.
Perhaps that should have been evident in the hours before kick-off. Biblical rain and severe weather warnings led German authorities to encourage fans without tickets to stay inside, and to watch the match at home if possible. The elements were deemed a threat to the safety of supporters, before their safety was even threatened by fan violence inside the BVB Stadium in Dortmund.
But when that violence began, as water spilt through the roof of the arena and fans spilt from their seats to attack one another, questions arose. Would the game go ahead, and if it were to, would it even resemble a football match?
To say the tension could be cut with a knife would be to give unnecessary credit to knives. You could have lacerated the tension with a balloon.
It felt as though everything could come crashing down at any moment, courtesy of the slightest move or even thought. It felt as if a foul on the pitch could incite a riot, such was the air of hostility, yet thankfully the violence in the stands did seem to have subsided by kick-off.
Brawls, biblical rain and wonder goals: Turkey vs Georgia turns Euro 2024 upside down
Turkey 3-1 Georgia: Fan violence and storms added an edge to the Group F game before it had even kicked off
Portugal player ratings vs Czechia: Cristiano Ronaldo left frustrated after clinch comeback victory
Portugal football had been talked about as among the favourites at Euro 2024, but they had to come from behind against Czechia to secure a hard-fought first win in Group F.
Cristiano Ronaldo’s side had dominated in the first half without really putting Czechia on the back foot, but Lukas Provod put his team ahead just after the hour mark completely against the run of play with a powerful strike.
It was only due to a fortunate own goal, which went in off Robin Hranac that Portugal managed to secure an equaliser. But after going level, it was Francisco Conceicao who scored the winner moments after coming on from the bench.
Here are Portugal’s player ratings from the win over the Czechs.
Portugal player ratings vs Czechia after Cristiano Ronaldo left frustrated
Portugal 2-1 Czechia: The star-filled Selecao were forced to dig deep in the tournament opener to secure three points
Record-breaking Cristiano Ronaldo upstaged as Portugal find the formula for Euro 2024 glory
Here’s a reminder of how Portugal’s first game went.
Cristiano Ronaldo spans the generations. He in effect replaced Sergio Conceicao in the Portugal squad two decades ago. Twenty years on, as Ronaldo set his latest record, Sergio’s son Francisco Conceicao proved Portugal’s rescuer, upstaging even the old master, providing the sort of dramatic late winner that has long been the 39-year-old’s trademark.
Roberto Martinez, unusually timid initially, had gambled after seeing a Diogo Jota goal disallowed and made a triple change on 90 minutes.
On, along with Nelson Semedo, came Pedro Neto and Conceicao. The two wingers had barely entered the game when they decided it. Neto’s cross was blocked but not cleared by the luckless Robin Hranac and fell for Conceicao to drive in. If nothing else, it was proof of Portugal’s immense depth of talent.
Record-breaking Ronaldo upstaged as Portugal find the formula for Euro 2024 glory
Portugal 2-1 Czech Republic: Francisco Conceicao scored late winner moments after being subbed on as Ronaldo’s side came from behind to win their Group F opener
Turkey v Portugal TV channel and how to watch
The match will kick off at 5pm BST on Saturday June 22, 2024, at the BVB Stadion Dortmund.
It will be shown live on ITV and ITVX, with coverage starting from 4:15pm BST. You can find a full list of which channel is showing each match here.
Portugal face familiar Cristiano Ronaldo questions which will define their Euro 2024 journey
Lothar Matthaus is 63 now. And if that may depress those who remember him in his dominant prime, let alone those who conjure images of him as German football’s wunderkind of the early 1980s, it has an added pertinence. He played in the last European Championship that did not feature Cristiano Ronaldo.
There are other ways of illustrating Ronaldo’s age, of course: Francisco Conceicao, scored of the late winner in the first game of Ronaldo’s sixth such tournament, was one year old when played in his first and is the son of a rival for a berth on the flanks, in Sergio Conceicao. His first goal for his country came in a European Championship. So did Ronaldo’s, but they were separated by two decades.
Longevity can be an achievement in itself. Ronaldo’s feats are measured more in goals but the simple fact that, 20 years on, he is still there is a feat. He has become the great constant of tournament football, up to 11 in a row, with the possibility he may yet make it a dozen in the 2026 World Cup. There is a sense Ronaldo, with his chiselled physique, thinks ageing is for mere mortals.
His next birthday is his 40th and he has scored 50 goals in club football this season; in the Saudi league, admittedly, but factor in his 10 strikes in European Championship qualifying and his appetite remains unsated. If the 2022 World Cup suggested his could be an undignified departure from international football, he has since staged a comeback: a substitute in Qatar has been reinvented as a Portugal starter in Germany.
At some stage, though, Roberto Martinez will face the same dilemma that confronted Fernando Santos: whether Ronaldo retains that status.
Portugal face familiar Ronaldo questions which will define their Euros journey
The No7 captained the Selecao but was not a star performer in their late win over Czech Republic
Euro 2024: Turkey v Portugal
Attention now turns to the other game in Group F, as leaders Turkey take on Portugal...
Is VAR at Euro 2024? ‘Snicko’, semi-automated offsides and technology explained
Here’s the lowdown on VAR and the so-called ‘Snicko’ at Euro 2024, after a potentially controversial decision in today’s early game and a controversially ruled out goal for the Netherlands last night.
Uefa will also utilise goal-line technology, with connected ball technology in play for the first time at a European Championship, starting with hosts Germany’s opening fixture against Scotland in Munich.
Here’s everything we know about the technology being used at Euro 2024.
Is VAR at Euro 2024? ‘Snicko’ and technology explained
The system was used at the 2022 World Cup in Qatar and now Uefa has adopted it for the first time at a European Championship
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