2015 UEFA European Under-17 Championship Finals
Greece 1-0 Scotland
Sunday, 10th May 2015, kick-off 5pm (local time)
Sozopol Stadium, Bulgaria

Pavlidis 38
    
A narrow 1-0 defeat at the hands of Greece this afternoon ended Scotland’s chances of reaching the quarter-finals of this year’s UEFA European Under-17 Championship.

Pavlidis scored the only goal of the game in a closely-fought encounter in Sozopol to kill off any hope of Scotland, who had Liam Burt sent off in injury time, reaching the last eight of the competition.

Scot Gemmill led last year’s crop of under-17s to the semi-finals of the competition but the group stage will be as far as this year’s squad will go in only Scotland’s third appearance at the finals.

The young Scots came into the match requiring at least a draw to keep their campaign alive following their 5-0 opening-day loss to France on Thursday.

Midfielders Ian Wilson and Frank Ross returned from a ban to take their place in the starting 11 whilst Lewis Morrison, who also missed the France defeat through suspension, was on the bench.

Scotland dominated possession in the opening exchanges and almost took the lead after five minutes.

Celtic midfielder Mark Hill’s free-kick was met by the head of Reading defender Tom McIntyre but the Greece goalkeeper tipped the ball onto the bar to deny Scotland an early goal.

Burt went close on 17 minutes after a neat exchange with Regan Hendry on the edge of the box but the goalkeeper made a good low stop from the Rangers midfielder.

Robby McCrorie, making his 15th European Under-17 Championship appearance, produced a superb stop from a one on one to prevent Kirtzialidis opening the scoring on 37 minutes,

However, the Greeks were in front 60 seconds later.

Kirtzialidis found Pavlidis with a neat pass inside the Scotland penalty area and his shot across McCrorie’s goal bounced into the back of the net via the inside of the post.

Greece went close to doubling their lead after the interval when Tsingas smashed the crossbar from six yards.

Substitute Glenn Middleton found Burt with a deep cross with nine minutes remaining but the midfielder headed straight at the Greece goalkeeper.

Burt was shown a straight red in the fourth minute of injury time with a late tackle on Retsos before the referee blew the full-time whistle to end the match and Scotland’s hopes of progressing any further in this year’s competition.

Scotland will play Russia in their final Group C match on Wednesday, kick-off 5pm (local time).

SCOTLAND | Robby McCrorie, Finlayson (Middleton 49), Ross McCrorie (c), McIntyre, Harvie, Wilson, Ross (Souttar 75), Hill, Burt, Miller (Morrison 68), Hendry.

Subs not used | Doohan (GK), Higgins, Aitchison, Rudden.