Romania won a major international tournament for the first time in 24 years on Monday, beating Ukraine 3-0 at Euro 2024, helped by two errors from goalkeeper Andriy Lunin. Captain Nicolae Stanciu’s magnificent long-range strike gave Romania, backed by the vast majority of Munich fans, a first-half lead in their opening Group E game. Razvan Marin’s long-range shot went past Lunin and Romania scored more two goals before the 60th minute, with Denis Dragus scoring the third. It was a disastrous start to the campaign for Ukraine, who will have to regroup quickly with the following games against Slovakia and Belgium.
Ukrainian players took to the field with Ukrainian flags draped over their shoulders in the country’s first game at a major tournament since the Russian invasion in February 2022.
They missed out on World Cup qualification two years ago but secured a fourth successive Euro appearance despite the backdrop of Europe’s biggest conflict since the Second World War.
Three years ago, Ukraine reached the quarter-finals under Andriy Shevchenko. But much has changed since then in the war-torn country, with his former strike partner Serhiy Rebrov now in charge.
Rebrov confided that simply participating in Germany, where more than a million Ukrainians have found refuge, is an important step for the nation.
He said he had received numerous messages from people in his country, including those fighting on the front lines, and that it was up to his team to “show the spirit” of Ukraine in difficult times.
Romania progressed through qualifying unbeaten but are without a win in four games this year before returning to the big stage after missing out on Euro 2020.
Their last and only previous victory in the tournament came when they reached the quarter-finals of Euro 2000.
Ukraine investigated early on a hot afternoon at the Allianz Arena, without success, and paid the price for bringing pressure on themselves, which led to a misplaced clearance from Lunin.
The Real Madrid goalkeeper played the ball straight to Dennis Man, who passed the ball for Stanciu to curl a sensational shot from 20 yards into the top corner.
Lunin was immediately consoled by Oleksandr Zinchenko, but was almost beaten again minutes later by Stanciu, this time from a corner.
After Man’s deflected shot went wide, Stanciu’s corner hit the post, with the Ukrainian goalkeeper flapping his wings in the air.
Worse was to come for Lunin, as after a quick Romanian counter-attack, Marin fired a low shot from 25 yards that appeared to deceive him at speed eight minutes into the second half.
Dragus effectively clinched victory shortly afterwards when he scored when Man tapped the ball into the six-yard box following a well-worked corner.
Romanian goalkeeper Florin Nita saved Georgiy Sudakov’s late shot well before substitute Roman Yaremchuk hit the post, summing up what was a day to forget for Ukraine.
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