‘He always makes the right decision’ – Tielemans applauds injured De Bruyne
Youri Tielemans has identified what makes absent Belgium teammate Kevin De Bruyne such a “special player” ahead of their Euro 2020 quarterfinal against Italy on Friday.
Belgium head coach Roberto Martinez declared that Manchester City midfielder De Bruyne will miss the quarter after sustaining an ankle knock in their last-16 win over Portugal. De Bruyne was also absent from training on Wednesday.
De Bruyne, who missed Belgium’s opening 3-0 win over Russia with a facial injury, has scored one goal and provided two assists during Euro 2020, helping the Red Devils win all four games, meaning Martinez has a difficult job replacing him.
“Kevin is a special player because in my opinion, he always makes the right decision, even if you think he misplaces a pass, it’s not,” Tielemans said during a news conference ahead of the quarterfinals.
“Always does something in his mind, always makes the right decision, very efficient, has a lot of assists or goals, that helps our team a lot.”
He added: “As a team we have to create more options on the ball, move more, and make the right choices.
“Maybe we were under pressure a little bit, second half against Portugal, they had a lot of offensive options on the pitch, made it difficult for us to get out of there, as a team we have to find those solutions.”
De Bruyne was replaced early in the second half against Portugal due to injury, before Belgium survived a barrage of pressure, with the 2016 European champions ending with 23-6 shots.
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Belgium, who finished third at the 2018 World Cup and lost in the quarters at the 2016 Euros, ground out the win in a sign of maturity according to Tielemans.
“We learnt lessons from 2018, we’re more realistic, we play nice football, certain matches we have a lot of possession, create chances,” the Leicester City midfielder said.
“Like you saw against Portugal there’s moments you have to suffer as a team, you might not get many opportunities, you have to score them, that’s where we learned from Russia, to be efficient, decisive in the right moment, when we have an opportunity to score we remember that from 2018.”