Turkey defeats Austria 2-1, moves to quarters
LEIPZIG, Germany (AP) — A first-minute goal and a stellar save in the final seconds helped send Turkey into the quarterfinals of Euro 2024.
Merih Demiral scored twice, including the opener after just 57 seconds, and goalkeeper Mert Gunok pulled off one of the saves of tournament deep into injury time as Turkey beat Austria 2-1 in the round of 16 on Tuesday.
“Our team spirit showed until the last minute,” Turkey coach Vincenzo Montella said.
Gunok showed great reflexes and agility, diving to his right to palm away a close-range header from Christoph Baumgartner four minutes into added time.
That save set up a quarterfinal on Saturday against the Netherlands, a team Montella said “fight like lions.”
“We will gather our mental and physical strength and keep following our path,” he said.
Austria had 21 attempts compared with Turkey’s six, regularly testing Gunok.
“I’m sure that if Baumi had scored to take the game to extra time, we would have gone on to win the match,” Austria coach Ralf Rangnick said. “The only thing we could be accused of is that we didn’t score enough goals from the chances we had, and that we didn’t work well twice for set pieces.”
The game got off to a ferocious start. Both teams had chances inside the first 30 seconds before Demiral scored when the Austrian defense failed to deal with a corner.
Baumgartner’s attempted clearance rebounded back off teammate Stefan Posch to goalkeeper Patrick Pentz, who scooped it off the line only for Demiral to pounce on the rebound and score.
It was the second-fastest goal ever at the Euros — Albania scored after 23 seconds against Italy in the group stage.