European Football Championships | The player and the expert criticized the unfair distribution of rest days in the European football championships: “The same would not be accepted on the men’s side”

Sport|European football championships

Rest days the division among the semi-finalists of the women’s European football championships is drawing criticism.

The quarterfinals of the games have been played on four consecutive days. England cleared their way to the semi-finals from Wednesday’s quarter-finals, Germany advanced on Thursday and Sweden on Friday. Today, Saturday, France and the Netherlands will decide the last semi-finalist.

The semi-finals will be played on Tuesday and Wednesday next week. England and Sweden will meet in the first match, Germany and the winner of the France-Netherlands match in the second. England and Germany therefore have five intervening days before their own semi-final match, while their opponents have three.

Especially in close-paced matches, the longer preparation time can be considered a clear advantage.

Holland’s midfielder Jackie Groene opened up about the situation Norwegian public radio for NRK.

“I find it strange that other countries get more rest than others. To be honest, I don’t really understand it,” Groenen stated in an interview with NRK.

Also an NRK expert and former soccer player Carl-Erik Torp considers the situation unfair. For him, the two-day difference in rest days is “huge” at the European Championships.

“I think this is a scandal. It’s all about bad design. This changes the competitive landscape a lot,” he said.

In last year’s European Men’s Football Championship, each semi-finalist had three days off before the semi-finals. In the 2016 men’s European Championships, the countries that made it to the semi-finals had a one-day difference in rest days.

“I believe that the same would not be accepted on the men’s side. If this had happened in the men’s games, there would have been a strong reaction to it. The design is really bad, almost unbelievable,” said Torp.