One of the favorites of the Euro is already taking the door. Beaten by Austria in their third pool match (0-1) on Friday July 15 in Brighton, Norway will not be in the quarter-finals. With two defeats for a single victory, Ada Hegerberg’s teammates are overtaken by their evening opponents in the race for the last qualifying place. It was Nicole Billa, the only scorer of the evening, who delivered Austria on a mighty head.
The disappointment is immense for Norway, which was expecting this Euro as a big party. Five years after a disastrous 2017 campaign, the team was counting on the return of its star Ada Hegerberg to find the European summits. But the Grasshoppers, who absolutely needed to win to continue the adventure, never weighed on the match. Manhandled by more dynamic Austrians, they experienced all the difficulties in the world to find their two attackers, Caroline Graham Hansen and Ada Hegerberg. The Lyonnaise leaves the competition without having scored a single goal.
3 – It is only the 3rd time in the 21st century (in 11 participations) that Norway does not pass the group stage of a major tournament (EURO + World Cup), after the 2011 World Cup and the EURO 2017. Fallen. #WEURO2022 #NOR pic.twitter.com/1QWLhsIKrc
— OptaJean (@OptaJean) July 15, 2022
Opposite, Austria made the match they needed to secure their place in the European top 8. Impactful and offensive, the players of Irene Fuhrmann struck the first ten minutes from half-time, then knew how to maintain their lead. The semi-finalists of the 2017 edition will challenge Germany, Thursday July 21, to try to find the last four.
In the other game of the evening, England, already qualified for the quarter-finals and guaranteed to finish in first place, easily won against a weak Northern Irish team (5-0). The “Lionesses” are still undefeated in the competition, and continue to take care of their statistics (14 goals scored, none conceded).
The English took almost a half to enter their match. After having stumbled on the opponent’s block for a long time, they ended up finding the fault just before the break. Led by Beth Mead, the tournament’s top scorer, who added a fifth goal to her tally, the “Lionesses” rolled out in the second half to claim a third victory and finish the group stage undefeated. They will find Spain or Denmark in the quarter-finals.