- Spain’s Lamal Yamal became the youngest scorer in Euros history on Tuesday
- His fine goal against France came after Adrien Rabiot publicly challenged him
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BBC Sport’s punditry team waxed lyrical about Lamine Yamal after his stunning strike helped Spain reach the Euro 2024 final on Sunday following a 2-1 win over France in the semi-finals.
Yamal made European Championship history on Tuesday night when he became the youngest scorer in the competition’s history.
The Spain wonderkid, aged just 16 years and 362 days, broke that record in style by finding the net with a stunning long-range strike against France.
Alan Shearer, who was part of the BBC’s punditry team on Tuesday night, hailed the teenage starlet during the half-time break.
‘Just incredible,’ said Shearer. ‘We’ve been talking about him this tournament and seeing him at 16, to come and perform at this level, under this scrutiny, and then to do that, just outrageous. I mean, he shouldn’t even be up that late!’
Rio Ferdinand added: ‘This young kid doing unprecedented stuff at this age is ridiculous’, before Gary Lineker declared that Yamal was ‘football’s next superstar’.
It arrived 21 minutes into Tuesday’s Euro 2024 semi-final after Randal Kolo Muani had earlier headed France in front.
Before bending the ball into the top corner of Mike Maignan’s net, Yamal dazzled France midfielder Adrien Rabiot with some fine footwork.
This came just a day after Rabiot had told reporters that Yamal needed to raise his game in order to trouble Les Bleus.
Rabiot said of Yamal on Monday: ‘We saw that he was a player who knew how to handle pressure very well. He has a lot of qualities. He is capable of playing with his qualities at club level as well as in major tournaments, without pressure.
‘Afterwards, it is always complicated to manage a semi-final in a tournament like that, but it will be up to us to put the pressure on him above all, not to let him feel comfortable and to show him that to play in a Euro final, he will have to do much more than what he has done so far.’
Yamal responded by writing on Instagram: ‘Move in silence. Only speak when it’s time to say checkmate.’
Prior to Yamal, Switzerland’s Johan Vonlanthen had held the record as the youngest scorer at a men’s European Championship.
Vonlanthen was aged 18 years and 141 days when he found the net at Euro 2004, also against France.
Meanwhile, Wayne Rooney – who scored for England against Switzerland 237 days after his 18th birthday in 2004 – has now dropped down to third place on the list.
Tuesday’s wonder-strike took Yamal’s tally of senior international goals to four, after he had netted three in his previous 12 appearances for La Roja.
The winger plays his club football for Barcelona and is a product of the club’s famous La Masia academy.