Mwene’s Austria fall to narrow defeat against France

On Monday evening, Ralf Rangnick’s Austria fell to a narrow 1-0 defeat in their opening clash of EURO 2024, despite delivering an impressive performance against a strong French XI over the 90 minutes. Mainz’s Phillip Mwene was named in the starting XI and remained on the pitch for 88 minutes, during which he repeatedly proved himself against PSG winger Ousmane Dembelé. Just seven minutes before the break, Kylian Mbappé managed to outpace the Mainz defender on the counter and delivered a cross into the middle, which Maximilian Wöber unfortunately nodded into the back of his own net. The Austrians were almost able to open the scoring just two minutes prior, which saw Christoph Baumgartner through on goal following some excellent combination play between Mwene and Marcel Sabitzer, yet the France keeper stopped the midfielder in his tracks. The 05er refused to take his foot off the gas and Austria relentlessly searched for an equaliser, but their numerous chances amounted to nothing. Ultimately, a draw would have been a fair result, as Rangnick’s side held firm against the French attacks and prevented them from posing any real threat to goal.

Despite not starting the tournament in the way they had hoped, Mwene and his teammates are all fired up for the next challenge, which will see Austria take on Poland in Berlin on Friday evening (18:00 CEST). Their final group stage match is also set to take place at the Olympiastadion, where Rangnick’s team will face off against the Netherlands on Tuesday (18:00 CEST).