Inter wide man Denzel Dumfries has been at the centre of attention in the EURO 2024 semi-final, as he gave away a controversial England penalty, performed a goal-line clearance for the Netherlands and hit the crossbar.
The right-back hasn’t particularly impressed in the tournament so far, but he was certainly drawing the spotlight in the semi-final this evening.
Dumfries centre of attention
After the Xavi Simons opener, VAR called back the referee to award a penalty for his high boot block on Harry Kane.
It was a very contentions decision, as they both seemed to go for the ball and some refereeing experts (and even England fans) did not think it would warrant a VAR On-Field Review, but German official Bastian Dankert thought otherwise and called Felix Zwayer to the monitor.
While this kind of penalty is given fairly regularly in Italy, it is also one that the authorities in Serie A are trying to eradicate, as when two players go for the ball, a matter of milliseconds can be the difference between a clean block and a penalty.
Dumfries made up for the spot-kick, as moments later he cleared a Phil Foden solo effort off the line to keep the score at 1-1.
The Inter man also nearly added to the scoreline, as his towering header on a corner thumped the crossbar.