Matthijs de Ligt has claimed responsibility for the Netherlands’ early departure from Euro 2020, admitting that his exclusion from the game at the start of the second half helped the Czech Republic win 2-0 on Sunday in Budapest.
Tomas Hole and Patrick Schick scored once in the second half against a Netherlands player who played with one player for almost the entire second 45 minutes at Puskas Arena on Sunday.
The Juventus defender stopped the ball with his hand as the last player in the Dutch defense, making it impossible for Schick to score an ideal one-on-one with the goalkeeper.
Judge Sergey Karasev only punished De Ligti with a yellow card initially, before being advised by the VAR chamber to review the incident.
Sergey changed his mind after reviewing the incident and expelling De Ligtin from the game.
Speaking after the match, De Ligt admitted to NOS TV: “Of course it hurts. “Eventually, we lost the game because of what I did.”
“Now I understand that I should not have let the ball dance. “I felt that they had the game under control and they had some opportunities, especially in the first half.”
He added: “I did not think the shallows were creating a lot of scoring chances, but of course the red card made the difference.”
For the first time in a major event, Euro or World, the Netherlands failed to make any shots inside the opposing goal frame on Sunday in the defeat against the Czech Republic.
The Netherlands has played 89 matches in European and World Cups in the history of its national team, but today failed to hit the goal for the first time.
The Dutch had seven shots in total in this match, but all these attempts were outside the goal frame.
This was another failure of the Netherlands in the Euro, as in 2016 it did not qualify at all and in 2012 could not pass the group stage.
