UEFA have announced that the UEFA EURO 2024 qualifying match between Belgium and Sweden, which was abandoned on Monday evening, will not be replayed or completed.
European football’s governing body has determined that the game, which was 1-1 at the time of the abandonment, will finish at 1-1. Viktor Gyokeres had opened the scoring for Sweden before Romelu Lukaku equalised from the penalty spot.
The game reached half-time before Sweden players decided to not return to the pitch following news that two Swedish supporters had been shot and killed in a terrorist attack in the city centre of Brussels prior to the match. Belgium’s squad agreed and followed their counterparts’ lead, forcing the match officials to initially suspend and then abandon the match.
Belgian police shot dead the man who carried out the attack on the Swedish nationals, killing two and seriously injuring, a third. Belgian media have named the 45-year-old attacker: Abdesalam; a Tunisian who was believed to be in Belgium as an illegal immigrant.
A minutes’ silence or applause was held at all of the venues hosting UEFA EURO 2024 qualifying matches on the Tuesday evening in the aftermath of the attack.
A controlled evacuation of the King Badouin II stadium in Brussels took place in the following hours with the crowd in the region of 35,000 supporters eventually leaving the ground at around midnight.
UEFA’s decision to not replay the game or complete the match has had no significant impact on the group standings with Belgium having already qualified for the tournament and Sweden already out.
The only material affect it could have would be on who wins the group between Belgium and Austria and that would then have an impact upon the seedings ahead of the group stage draw for the competition in December. Belgium finish their qualifying campaign at home to Azerbaijan next month, whilst Sweden will go away to Azerbaijan before finishing up at home to Estonia.
