Netherlands beats Türkiye to advance to Euro 2024 semi-finals

The Netherlands are between England and a place in next Sunday’s final, but it only tells half of the story of a night that veered in every possible direction.

In the end, they beat a tenacious Turkey, aided in large part by throwing everything at it.

Wout Weghorst watched from the bench as all of his teammates’ first-half attempts failed.

After a promising start, they fell under their opponents’ sheer will, aggression, intensity, and noise, and deserved to be a goal down at halftime. Ronald Koeman realised his team were rushing into a brick wall and reached for the 6ft 6in totem, whose introduction eventually reversed the tide and sent an orange wave towards Dortmund.

Weghorst gave the Netherlands a decisive focal point but, before assessing his attacking impact, it is worth zeroing straight in on a remarkable piece of defensive work that kept them in the game. Turkey were looking capable of scoring a second goal, tearing the Dutch defence up on the break and striking a post through an extraordinary Arda Guler free-kick, when Bart Verbruggen spilled Kenan Yildiz’s drive in the 65th minute. The way was clear for Kaan Ayhan to gobble up the loose ball before Weghorst, lying on the ground, showed astonishing reactions to poke out a leg and save the day.

The game would surely have been up if Ayhan had converted. In the next significant action Weghorst was peeling off at the far post in the other penalty area, sought by the latest of several crosses from the left side. His volley, half caught in truth, was tipped wide by Mert Gunok and it was time to load the box again. Memphis Depay took the corner short, received the return pass and crossed on to the head of the towering Stefan de Vrij. The centre-back did the rest from 12 yards and Turkey, comfortably the better side for the middle 40 minutes, were deflated.

Soon they were behind after Denzel Dumfries, who had come back from an offside position, was found unattended on the right and curved a glorious low centre across the face of goal. It was met by a mixture of Cody Gakpo and the right-back Mert Muldur, who both hurled themselves at the ball, and their combined force sent it flashing past a helpless Gunok.

Four days previously Gunok had been Turkey’s hero with a late save for the ages from Austria’s Christoph Baumgartner. Moments like that can leave the impression your name is on the trophy but football has a habit of turning the tables. With Turkey pushing ferociously for an equaliser in the first minute of added time, their substitute Semih Kilicsoy timed his run perfectly and jabbed towards goal from six yards. Verbruggen should have had no chance but somehow, diving to his right, scooped clear to give them a bitter taste of their own medicine.

How vigorously they had fought, their every run and challenge so intensely meant. Before Verbruggen’s stop they were also denied extra time by a monumental block from Micky van de Ven when Zeki Celik took aim at a seemingly open goal. What Vincenzo Montella’s team lacks in control, it atones for in gusts of pressure that threaten to blow opponents away.

One such first-half spell resulted in an opener that raised the roof. They had survived a couple of Netherlands half chances and gained impetus when Guler, magical to watch once again, delivered deliciously with his weaker right foot and watched the centre-back Samet Akaydin crash his header past Verbruggen from an angle.