Romania: World Cup Champions France lost to the 13th ranked Switzerland side in the Round-of-16 match in Euro 2020. Kylian Mbappe, in a surprising turn of events, missed a penalty which caused France's loss. The young French star is devastated after this penalty miss, he said: "I am sorry for this penalty. I wanted to help the team but I failed."
France was leading 1-3 in the knockout match in the final 10 minutes, but Switzerland scored twice to make the score 3-3. There were no goals scored in the extra time which eventually led to a penalty shoot-out. Mbappe was taking the fifth penalty and missed it which ended the penalty shootout at 5-4 in favour of the Swiss team.
Naturally, such kind of a close loss is heart-breaking for the losing team. Mbappe was France's main man in their World Cup-winning campaign of 2018 and to miss such a crucial penalty has taken an emotional toll on him.
Read his full statement in English here:
“It is very difficult to turn the page. The sadness is immense after this elimination, we were not able to achieve our objective. I am sorry for this penalty. I wanted to help the team but I failed. It will be hard to sleep but sadly these are the risks of this sport that I love so much. I know that you the fans are disappointed, but I would still like to thank you for your support and for having always believed in us. The most important thing will be to get up even stronger for the challenges to come. Congratulations and good luck to Switzerland.”
The French coach Didier Deschamps stood firmly with Mbappe and did not blame him for the loss. “Nobody can be annoyed with him. When you take the responsibility, it can happen. He is obviously very affected by it. Kylian takes responsibility, he feels guilty, but he shouldn’t. The squad is united, it always has been," the coach said.