Poland win 5-4 on penalties
POLAND reached their first- ever European Championship quarter- final with a penalty shoot-out victory over Switzerland.
A Jakub Blaszczykowski strike had looked to be enough in normal time for Poland, only for Stoke’s Xherdan Shaqiri to make it 1- 1 with a tremendous athletic volley and send the game into extra-time.
With no winning goal found, the tie was decided on penalties, with new Arsenal signing Granit Xhaka missing for Switzerland and Seville’s Grzegorz Krychowiak hammering home the winning penalty as Poland scored all five efforts.
Poland should have been ahead inside 30 seconds when Swiss goalkeeper Yann Sommer bowled the ball out to Johan Djourou, who passed it back across his box, only for Robert Lewandowski to pounce.
Sommer did enough to nick the ball off the toe of the Bayern Munich forward but it fell to Arkadiusz Milik, who could only fire over the crossbar with the goal at his mercy.
Poland missed another good chance when Krychowiak headed over a corner just before the half-hour mark.
Moments later, Kamil Grosicki and Milik wasted further good chances for Poland, with Switzerland getting a rare effort on goal but Fabian Schar’s header was easily saved by Lukasz Fabianski.
The Swansea stopper was then forced to tip a deflected Blerim Dzemaili strike behind for a corner, from which Poland broke forward to open the scoring.
With six minutes to go before the break, Grosicki led a counter- attack which was swept home by Blaszczykowski to give Adam Nawalka’s side a deserved half-time lead.
Shaqiri looked to give Switzerland a strong start to the second half as he burst into the box before seeing his cross cleared behind, with Poland defender Michal Pazdan almost turning the resulting corner into his own goal.
Blaszczykowski came close to adding a second as he cut inside before hammering in an effort which Sommer pushed away.
Switzerland began to push forward and Fabianski made a great save from Ricardo Rodriguez’s free- kick as Poland continued to defend their clean sheet.
Their change of emphasis finally paid off as Shaqiri’s acrobatic scissor- kick from the edge of the box beat Fabianski to equalise with eight minutes left.
Neither side could find a winner in the closing stages with some players showing signs of tiredness as referee Mark Clattenburg blew the fulltime whistle to signal a period of extra-time.
The first 15 minutes of extra- time followed suit as there were no clear-cut chances for either side and Fa bian ski again made a good save in the second period, pushing out substitute Er en Derdiyok’s effort after he had been found by the impressive Shaqiri.
No winning goal was forthcoming and the first round of 16 tie was decided on penalties.