Off the Pitch: Euro 2020 – Day 11

From the North Macedonian striker Goran Pandev hanging up his boots and going off with a beautiful gesture from both the N. Macedonian national team and Dutch national team, to

being slammed by virtually everyone, many things happened yesterday as yet another beautiful and intense day in Euro 2020 came to an end. Let’s see what else happened off the pitch yesterday.

Euro 2020 – Day 11 Review

Here’s a peak at everything that went on in the tournament and off the football pitch.

A beautiful farewell

37-year-old North Macedonia international

finally decided to hang up his boots during his national team’s 3-0 defeat against the

. Even though he and his country didn’t get to have much a successful tournament, Pandev actually made history as he led his team into Euro 2020, which is North Macedonia’s very first major tournament. That alone earned Pandev an emotional guard of honor, which brought tears to the eyes of many.

Holland also made another beautiful gesture by gifting Pandev a Netherlands national team shirt with the striker’s name on it. Pandev ended his international career after 20 years, 122 appearances and a total of 38 goals. His name will always be remembered in the footballing halls of fame as the striker that took North Macedonia into their first major tournament. A true legend.

Despite his international shortcomings, Pandev is quite a decorated footballer and has played for some of the best teams in the world. He started his professional career in his home country, but quickly joined

back in 2002. After spending a couple of years on loan at Spezia and Ancona, the North Macedonian joined

for €8 million in 2004. That was when his professional career took a turn as he proved to be a successful striker. He then moved back to Inter in 2010, before going on to spend his time at Napoli, Galatasaray and Genoa.

Pandev has won quite so many trophies throughout his illustrious career, including a Turkish league trophy, the Turkish Cup, five Coppa Italia trophies, two Italian Super Cups, the 2009-10 Scudetto, the FIFA Club World Cup and most importantly the 2009-10 Champions League trophy.

This one’s for you Christian

fans must be buzzing right now as their national team managed to secure a position in the knockout stages of Euro 2020 after their 4-1 thrashing of Russia yesterday. With Denmark players having to deal with missing one of their key teammates

after he suffered a sudden cardiac arrest during their first game of the tournament against Finland, many hailed Denmark for having the strength to bounce back and go through to the next stage even without Eriksen.

One pundit, Alan Shearer, was particularly impressed by the Danish national team as he hailed the “amazing scenes” he had just witnessed. What he referred to was in fact the celebrations that only started a couple of minutes after Denmark’s win against Russia, as they only got to know about their qualification after news of Finland’s loss to Belgium.

The sneaky business

Scotland international

sneakily deleted his video showing him playing ping-pong with his mates John McGinn and Billy Gilmour. Why would he delete such a video and why would people care? You ask? Well, it turns out Billy Gilmour has in fact tested positive for COVID, which might mean that UEFA could stop Andy Robertson from playing in their last match of the group stage against Croatia if they suspect anything.

Scotland national team denied any close contacts in the squad, but it didn’t help much as people were aware of the situation. Surely

would not want to lose any more of their star players, as they have already lost Billy Gilmour, who produced a man-of-the-match display in their 0-0 draw against England.

Gilmour is only 20 years old, but he has nevertheless managed to rack up four different man-of-the-match awards on his four debuts in different tournaments. The Scottish midfielder has already showed the world what a talent he is, but surely he would not want to be at fault for spreading the Coronavirus amongst his friends and international teammates, right?

Is it coming home?

While England’s performance at Euro 2020 has been utterly disappointing for many and while nobody knows what the bloody problem is, it seems that Croatia international

knows the answer for all questions. The 35-year-old slammed the Three Lions for being too arrogant, which has led to them expecting much more than they can deliver. Of course he cleared things out by adding that it’s not the players who’re arrogant, but “the people around them, some of the journalists and commentators.”

Thinking about what Modric said, some believe that he might be right, as it is the media and the journalists around the England national team that boast about the trophy finally coming home. But the arrogance has hurt the squad quite deeply as they’ve not been able to deliver the standards that the media expect from them.

Gareth Southgate will have quite a dilemma in his mind since he has called up so many right-backs and defenders and just not enough attacking players. Harry Kane was completely alone during their draw against Scotland, which cost them two crucial points in the second matchday of Euro 2020.

Will this arrogance cost England dearly? Or will Southgate and his men bounce back and prove everyone, especially modric, wrong with a stellar display in the Round of 16? At least the know that they have automatically qualified for the next round and don’t need to put much pressure on themselves to defeat Czech Republic. Of course the Three Lions will try their best to prove that they are still the favorites, but the outcome is still unknown.

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