Blucerchiati stars bow out of Euro U-21 in Poland

Sampdoria’s quartet in action at the UEFA European Under-21 Championship have sadly all been knocked out of the competition at the group stage.Bruno Fernandes, Karol Linetty, Patrik Schick and Milan Skriniar couldn’t help their teams progress into the semi-finals and thus return home.

In Group A, Linetty’s Poland lost their third and final game against group winners England 3-0, the goals coming from Demarai Gray (6), Jacob Murphy (69) and Lewis Baker (82). Overall, it has been a poor campaign from the hosts, who only managed to bag one point in three games. Milan Skriniar was also left disappointed as Slovakia finished second despite beating Sweden 3-0 (Martin Chrien 5, Jaroslav Mihalik 22 and Lubomir Satka 73). However, they had to go home on account of having a worse goal difference than Germany in Group C.

A suspension ruled Bruno Fernandes out of Portugal’s 4-2 win against FYR Macedonia on Friday. A second-place finish with six points and a +2 goal difference wasn’t enough for Rui Jorge’s team either, as the under-21s failed to match the achievement of the senior side last summer in France. Edgar Ie (2), Bruma (22, 90+1) and Daniel Podence (56) got on the scoresheet for Portugal, while Enis Bardi (40) and Kire Markoski scored for Macedonia.

Patrik Schick’s Czech Republic slipped up against Denmark when a win could have taken them through to the semi-finals. In an entertaining match against the team propping up Group C, Vitezslav Lavicka’s players went down to a goal out of nowhere by Lucas Andersen in the 23rd minute. Patrik Schick equalised minutes later, before Kenneth Zohore re-established Denmark’s lead ten minutes before half-time. Tomas Chory levelled up for the Czechs at the start of the second half before Zohore scored again in the 73rd minute. Marcus Ingvartsen put matters to bed in injury time.

The semi-finals will be England v Germany and Spain v Italy. Good luck to them.