Hungary surpassed the result they achieved at the European Championship three years ago in terms of points, since last time they bade farewell to the tournament without winning a match.

This time, the squad earned three points, but even this wasn't enough to reach the Round of 16.

In hindsight, it was a bit of a disadvantage to us that Hungary were in the first group to finish their fixtures, so several other national teams already knew exactly what was required of them before their own last match.

Marco Rossi's squad scored two goals in three matches, both of which were scored by OTP Bank Liga forwards, the first coming from Barnabás Varga of Ferencváros, and the second scored by Kevin Csoboth of Újpest FC.

After the summer break, Hungary will play in the Nations League in the autumn against Germany, Netherlands and Bosnia.

Next year, an even bigger and more difficult challenge awaits the team when the World Cup qualifiers begin.

In those, Hungary will attempt to qualify for the biggest tournament in the world again, 40 years after their last participation in Mexico in 1986.

Rossi: We deserved to win based on chances created

Hungary emerged victorious from their final group match against Scotland with a goal scored in the 100th minute and finished in third place in Group A with three points.

After the match, head coach Marco Rossi stated that luck was finally on the team's side in this match and he dedicated the success to Hungary fans who'd travelled to Stuttgart.

"Scotland had more possession of the ball, especially in the first half, but it was an even match in the second," Rossi opined after the match. "After the 70th minute, there was a lot of rushing on the pitch, but we had more chances, so I feel we deserved the victory.

I'm happy we have our first victory in the tournament, mainly because of the thousands of fans in the stadium who travelled back and forth to the games, so we dedicate this success to them. I'd have been very disappointed if we'd returned home without any points, so it'd be quite different now to go home even if we don't manage to advance from this group.

We had three matches in the group and I can only really bring up the first half against Switzerland when we played really badly. Against Germany, we played as well as we could, but were unlucky in several situations, but defeat is always a bigger possibiity against the hosts. Today, luck finally smiled on us, so we hope that this is a good sign and that it won't turn away from us."

In response to a journalist's question, Rossi stated that Dominik Szoboszlai hadn't been fully fit before the match and hadn't been able train since the Germany match due to muscle problems.

"Szoboszlai has undergone a series of treatments which made it possible for him to play today, but without him the Hungarian national team would be very different. I wanted to take him off in the last few minutes because he was tired, but I left him on, because he can always decide a match.

However, Csoboth was the man to win it this time and he performed just as I wanted him to. He made good runs, shot against the post, scored a goal and overall had a huge impact on the game."

Barnabás Varga's injury was of course also discussed at the press conference: "Barni was not himself after the collision and everyone was very worried about him. Fortunately, he's fine now and that's the most important thing, but he's broken his cheekbone, so he won't be able to help the team any further at this European Championship if we progress to the round of 16."
 

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