The captain of the England football team, Harry Kane, said that his team missed a great opportunity to win the European Championship and that the defeat in the final against Spain will hurt for a long time.
"It's a missed opportunity. It's not easy to get into the final. You have to take the opportunity when it comes and we failed to do that again. It's extremely painful and it's going to hurt for a long time," Kane told ITV, reported (BBC).
England lost 2:1 to Spain in the final of the European Championship in Berlin. It is England's second consecutive defeat in the finals of the European championships, after the defeat against Italy three years ago after penalty kicks.
Last night, Spain took the lead in the 47th minute with a goal scored by Nico Williams, and Cole Palmer equalized in the 73rd minute. Mikel Ojarzabal brought victory to Spain in the 86th minute.
"It's hard to express how we all feel now. This was a difficult game. We got back into the match well and we struggled to take advantage of it. It's hard to accept that we conceded a goal in the end. During the tournament we constantly came back from the deficit, but we failed to take the next step," Kane said.
"We struggled in the first half. We didn't manage to keep the ball. The second half was better and we had more of the ball." Defeat in the final is hard to accept. It's all about big chances, we had one at the end of the game, when they cleared the ball off the goal line, this is really disappointing," added the captain, who scored three goals in the competition.
Kane said that the team showed during the tournament that they are resilient, but that he is aware that they will be judged by this game.
England coach Gareth Southgate announced that after the European Championship, he will decide whether he will remain in office.
"He will take some time to decide. We all wanted to win the trophy for him. We made it clear that we love the manager but it is his decision, now is not the time to talk about it, we are all suffering," Kane said.
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