In the quarter-final of the European Cup on July 7, Switzerland and England fought to the penalty shootout, and finally lost. After the match, Swiss player Shaqiri was interviewed, expressing his feelings about the result of the match and his outlook on the team's future.
Shaqiri began by confessing the cruelty of losing on penalties: "I believe there is nothing crueler than being eliminated in a penalty shootout. We fought hard and gave everything we had just to keep the fairy tale going. But that's the way soccer is, sometimes even if you do well, you can miss out on victory because of some tiny details."
Despite the result, Shaqiri spoke highly of his team's performance: "I'm very proud of the team and I'm sure we made a lot of people proud and happy. This has been our biggest goal. During the game, we showed tenacity and team spirit, which is the essence of Swiss soccer."
For the penalty shootout loss, Shaqiri said, "We were very close to advancing, but unfortunately England's mental quality was better. They showed more stability and self-belief at that critical moment. This is something we need to learn and improve."
Meanwhile, Shaqiri also saw the positive impact of the game: "I believe we played an excellent game, which will stay in people's memories. You can also see on social media that people are celebrating for us and this frenzy motivates us. It reminds us that no matter what the result is, our efforts and performance have been recognized. We will take this motivation and turn it into motivation to be ready for the next tournament."
Finally, Shaqiri expressed his expectations for the future: "Although this tournament is over, our soccer road continues. We will summarize the lessons learned and try to improve our technical and tactical level and mental quality. I believe we will prove ourselves again in the near future."
