Euro Wrap, June 20: Croatia 1(1) – 1(3) Turkey

To say, “Turkey wins it on penalties” doesn’t even come close. Even if you add “after coming from behind. Again,” it still doesn’t quite capture this game.

What we had today was 118 minutes of nil-nil, with a few blasts of excitement here and there to perk things up, followed by 2 minutes of red-hot sizzle. And then penalties.

Match recap, with highlight videos, after the jump.

QUARTER-FINAL 2	June 20th, 2045 CET, Vienna (Austria)
Croatia 1 (1) VS Turkey 1 (3) Klasnic 119′   Senturk 120′

After the first 118 minutes, I was ready to write this game off as boring. Occasional bursts of nice play by both teams, some good saves by both keepers (and a couple of blunders by the out-of-practice substitute Turkish goalkeeper Rustu Recber, who took awhile to warm up), and nobody able to capitalize enought to put the ball into the net. If I hadn’t been liveblogging the game, I might have turned it off.

That would have been a mistake.

In the 119th minute, Ivan Klasnic did it again. He scored against Poland on Monday, and today he came off the bench and scored again against Turkey. It looked like this:

Scoreless for 118 minutes, and then, finally a goal. Surely it’s over for the Turks, right?

Not so fast. This was followed immediately with an amazing comeback goal by Turkey, blasted in by sub Semih Senturk, literally seconds before the whistle blew. (And several seconds after Slaven Bilic thought the whistle should have blown.)

And so it went to penalties. Sadly for Slaven Bilic’s men, they never recovered from the shock of the second goal, or from the frustration at having it take place after Bilic felt the game should have been over, and it showed in their penalties.

First the normally amazing Luca Modric sent it just wide for Croatia. Then Arda Turan buried it for Turkey. Dario Srna put one in for Croatia, making it 1-1, but that was the last time it things would look good for Bilic’s men. Semih Senturk did it again, making it 2-1. Then Ivan Rakitic sent it wide for Croatia (still 2-1), and Hamit Altintop sent it home for Turkey (3-1.) The last chance fell to Mladen Petric, but Rustu was the hero and came up with the save. And that was it. It was all over. Turkey wins it 3-1 on penaltiies and goes on to face Germany in the semis.

And here’s how the penalty shootout went down.

Now the big question for Turkey is whether or not they’ll even be able to field a team. They were down to fifteen players today, and only Mehmet Aurelio is guaranteed to be back. And today they lost Turan, Tuncay and Asik to second yellows, and superstriker Nihat to possible injury. Do the math. Things are looking a bit scary.

But I, for one, wouldn’t bet against the Turks until after the final whistle has blown.

Bracket Update
Omar continues to lead in the Euro 2008 Bracket Predictor Contest, but his lead is only one point over group stage champion Elena and four points over five others, including Otgonbaatar from Mongolia, one of the few brave souls who picked Turkey to go to the semifinals. Check out your standings, and stay tuned.