Paul Gascoigne started the move by winning the ball off Thomas Hassler on the England left. Darren Anderton gave it to Sheringham, who lofted it across the field towards Alan Shearer on the right of the area.
Euro '96's top scorer had peeled away from Markus Babbel, then allowed the ball to drop onto his right foot and belted a volley back across goal.
“It was a cross-come-shot for me,” Shearer tells FourFourTwo 28 years later. “It was one of those where, if you hit it to the far post, somebody might get on the end of it.
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It bobbled past the diving Andreas Kopke in the German goal, leaving Gascoigne in front of an open goal – but the mercurial midfield’s football IQ proved to be his downfall on this occasion. It is almost as if he was trying to be too clever and read the goalkeeper’s parry. He hesitated…
“I’ve watched it back a million times, as you can imagine, and I’m thinking, ‘What the f**k have you stopped for?’ There was that split-second, which maybe made the difference. I don’t know why he hesitated.”
It was an open goal, and he seemed certain to score. Gascoigne ended up half in the net, face down. The ball wasn’t with him.
It would’ve been a Golden Goal as well. Full-time, game over, England into their first major final of a major tournament in 30 years against Czech Republic who were 80/1 to win the tournament at the start.
“When I scored after just a minute and a half in the semi-final [vs Germany] – yeah, we got the feeling. But we knew Germany. Against good opposition you’re going to have to suffer.
“You need a little bit of luck here and there. They could have won it, we could have won it with Gazza in extra-time, but then it went down to penalties once again.”
Gazza has since said he would’ve celebrated by attempting to run out of the stadium. He wouldn’t have got that far, he would’ve been mobbed by team-mates, staff, fans, stewards.
It remains one of England’s biggest sliding doors moments.
Alan Shearer was speaking to FourFourTwo as part of his work with Topps to promote the official UEFA EURO 2024 sticker collection, available now from Topps.com and all good retailers
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