The Austrian national team won group D at the 2024 European Cup. Group D is said to be one of the hellish groups at the 2024 European Cup, which consists of France, the Netherlands, Poland and Austria.
Surprisingly, Austria, coached by Coach Ralf Rangnick, is at the top of Group D with a collection of 6 points above France and the Netherlands.
Austria managed to become group winners after winning 3-2 against the Netherlands at the Olympiastadion stadium, Berlin and in a different place France was held to a 1-1 draw by Poland.
Austria emerged as group winners with a collection of 6 points. Then, followed by France with 5 points and the Netherlands with 4 points. Group D also represented three teams in the round of 16 because the Netherlands was in the category of teams with the best three positions.
The match between Austria vs Netherlands is one of the most tense matches so far in the European Cup. Both teams exchanged attacks from the minute the first half whistle sounded.
Austria took the lead in the early minutes thanks to D. Malen’s own goal (6th minute). The own goal occurred through an Austrian counter-attack scheme which was wrongly anticipated by the Belana back line. The own goal was the only goal scored in the first half.
In the second half, the intensity of the game between both teams did not decrease. Both teams attacked each other again. This is proven by the four goals scored.
The Netherlands equalized two minutes after the start of the second half through Liverpool striker Cody Gakpo. Then, Austria took the lead again in the 59th minute.
Not wanting to be left behind, through Memphis Depay, the Netherlands made the score 2-2. However, the Dutch back line did not block the movement of midfielder M. Sabitzer who managed to escape the Dutch back line.
The Austrian players don’t seem to hesitate to take on the strength of the Dutch national team. Even the Austrian players did not hesitate to control the ball.
Austria was one of the surprises in the 2024 European Cup tournament. Starting their first match in group qualifying with a fairly narrow defeat to France, Austria recovered when they played against Poland with a 3-1 win.
The peak was when Austria did not hesitate to take on the game of one of the strong teams, the Netherlands. Aggressive play and no hesitation in controlling the ball is Austria’s pattern of play. Also, breakthrough passes in the opponent’s back line became Austria’s mainstay in threatening and scoring goals against the Netherlands.
Austria’s two goals occurred in the same scheme, where the Austrian players were able to read the gaps between the Dutch defenders to make breakthrough passes and then create goals.
Austria created a surprise from Group D.
Unexpectedly, the team ranked 25th in the world won the group ahead of France, which was ranked 2nd and the Netherlands, which was ranked 7th. Austria’s surprise could not be separated from the team playing system that Ralf Rangnick had built over the last two years.
Austria’s performance and success in qualifying for the 2024 European Cup has once again increased Ralf Rangnick’s reputation.
Rangnick became the topic of conversation in the world of football after being chosen to coach Manchester United (MU). Rangnick was chosen as interim coach to replace Ole Gunnar Solksjaer, who was fired by MU in November 2021.
Rangnick was also contracted to be a consultant at MU until 2024 but the agreement ended because Erik Ten Hag seemed reluctant to work with Rangnick.
Rangnick was appointed coach by MU because of the game philosophy of “gegenpressing”, a fast attacking game that utilizes the speed of players on each line. In fact, Rangnick is considered the “father of geggenpressing”, and this is also recognized by Jurgen Klopp, Thomas Tuchel and Julian Nagelsmann who play the same game system.
However, Rangnick was not successful in implementing this game at MU. Cristiano Ronaldo criticized Rangnick and considered that Rangnick was not a coach.
In fact, according to Ronaldo, of all the coaches who trained him, he called them boss because that was normal in a club. However, for Ronaldo, in his heart he never saw Rangnick as a boss.
Rangnick believes that one of MU’s weaknesses is the physicality of MU players. Rangnick arrived when the Premier League competition was already underway and he did not have time to do work to strengthen the players’ physical systems to support his playing system.
After terminating his contract with the “Red Devils”, nicknamed MU, Rangnick was immediately recruited by the Austrian national team in April 2022.
Since then, he has slowly built Austria from a team that was temporarily disappointed because it failed to qualify for the 2022 World Cup to a team that looks like it will be easy to qualify for the 2024 European Cup.
In the Austrian National Team, Rangnick has the freedom to shape the players and the team’s playing system. Rangnick builds an attacking and aggressive game without thinking about who the opponent is.
ASL
