Blue-and-white bows out of Euro qualifying
Zahavi & Co. take lead on Iceland before complacency, missed penalty and hungry foe sink them
Israel fell to Iceland 4-1 in the semifinals of the European Championship playoffs and was eliminated from Euro 2024 contention.
Albert Gudmundsson scored a hat-trick to see the visitors through to the finals, where it will face Ukraine.
Alon Hazan decided to keep arguably his best player in Oscar Gloukh on the bench to begin the game that saw Eran Zahavi give Israel a 1-0 lead via the penalty spot, but Gudmundsson drew Iceland even and Arnor Ingvi Traustason gave them the lead ahead of the break.
Roy Revivo was sent off with a red card in the second half, but Zahavi had a chance to level the score once again via a penalty kick but this time the striker missed wide left.
That opened the door for Gudmundsson to score two more goals late in the game to secure the victory and send Israel packing.
Hazan’s squad was supposed to head to play Bosnia and Herzegovina in a friendly after having fallen to Ukraine, but the game was canceled at the request of both associations due to the security situation in the Holy Land,
When you are playing with 10 men and you are trying to advance in a knockout game, we had to rush forward,” Hazan said. “The issue was that we were winning 1-0 and we didn’t push ahead, but that’s football. When you have a chance to draw even at 2-2 with 10 men it’s obviously not great to come up short, but it is what it is.” Zahavi also spoke about the defeat. “It’s not pleasant as this is yet another
chance that we blew. We were winning and then fell behind. We are just not good enough. We didn’t deserve to advance and we saw all of our issues come out and we just didn’t deserve to play in the next game. If we didn’t go into the break behind, things may have looked different. The greats have missed penalties and I made one in the first half, but with 10 men we would have had a hard time anyways should we have drawn even.”
“This is a huge disappointment for us,” Gaby Kanichowsky said. “They were very physical and we couldn’t find any solutions, we weren’t good. This hurts a lot and is so disappointing I have no words to describe it. We played, but we have to remember that there are still his games being held and a war is going on which makes everything even more painful and sad, but this is the situation that we are in.”
After an opening 30 ho-hum minutes of soccer that saw the majority of play in the midfield, Zahavi broke free and was
pulled down in the box, good for a penalty which the striker promptly put behind the Iceland ’keeper Hakon Rain Valdimarsson to give Israel a 1-0 lead. However, it didn’t take long for the visitors to not only draw even but take the lead.
Kanichowsky’s foul allowed Gudmundsson to step up and place a perfect free kick into the top right corner of the goal. Omri Glazer’s leaping attempt to save the ball just came up short as Iceland drew even at 1-1 in the 38th minute.
Two minutes later an unmarked Traustason was left all alone in the middle of the box as he pounded home the ball to give Iceland a 2-1 advantage as the match headed into the halftime break.
Hakon Arnar Haraldsson began the second half with a scorching attempt at the Israeli goal, but Glazer was up to the task to parry the ball away, while Gloukh, who was introduced at the start of the half, set a stunner towards the Iceland goal but that was saved.
Anan Khalaili and Gloukh teamed up on yet another brilliant attempt by the latter, but the Icelandic ’keeper was in the right spot to make the stop in the 60th minute.
Gudmundsson and Ramzi Safouri traded chances as the clock hit the 70th minute, while just minutes later Revivo was sent off with a straight red card for a two-footed reckless tackle on Sigurdsson, leaving Israel with 10 men for the balance of the contest.
However, a handball in the box off of a Zahavi free kick gave the blue-and-white star scorer a chance to draw Israel even, but his spot kick went wide left of the goal to keep the score as is, 2-1 in favor of Iceland in the 78th minute.
With Iceland in control, Gudmundsson added his second and third goals of the game by beating Glazer first with a looping ball into the net and then slotting it home inside the area to complete a comfortable victory to eliminate Israel from Euro 2024 contention.