Under 21s share six goals in Baku

Hungary Under 21s' next competitive game is away in Sweden in a European Championship qualifier but on Friday they took to the pitch in Baku to finetune their approach in a friendly match against Azerbaijan. Some of the U21s best performances in this current qualification campaign were absent due to full national-team call-ups so coach Michael Boris decided to test some new names at this level to see if they could convince him they could be a part of his squads over the next two to three years.

Hungary started on the back foot here though and it was the hosts who dominated the early exchanges and largely played in our defensive half of the pitch without really creating any clear chances. Instead, it was Hungary who took the lead in the 26th minute when Gábor Makrai pounced on a defensive error and rounded the goalkeeper before slotting into an empty net.

The game then opened up much more and the hosts had their first real opportunity when goalkeeper Ádám Zima passed the ball into a bad area and it was only a superb block from Attila Szalai which prevented an Azeri shot becoming the equaliser. The home side would rue that miss five minutes later when another defensive mistake allowed Attila Haris to fire the ball into the bottom-left corner of the net from 14 metres out.

Boris changed goalkeeper at half-time, Balázs Tóth replacing Zima, while Bence Gergényi came on in defence and Péter Forgács took up a position on the left, but those changes didn't have a positive immediate effect as an Azeri attacked took a tumble in the box and Sahverdiyev stepped up to convert the subsequent penalty in the 48th minute. The two-goal cushion was restored only a couple of minutes later though when Mátyás Tajti played a one-two with Kristóf Hinora before dispatching the ball into the top-right corner of the net from 17 metres.

More substitutes arrived in the form of András Schafer and Bence Szabó but it was Azerbaijan whoseemed to gain new momentum and after hitting the sidenetting in the 57th minute they halved the deficit ten minutes later, a right-wing cross evading the defence and being diverted in by Dadasov. Four minutes later and thoe home team completed a remarkable comeback when Krivotsyuk headed a left-wing corner into the Hungarian net.

Thereafter , both teams had chances to score a winner but neither managed it and therefore the two sides had to settle for an exciting 3-3 draw.

Michael Boris: "It's a disappointment after a two-goal lead that we weren't able to win the match but we achieved our aim in this match of testing out several new players. We could see several did not yet have experience of international football at this level but this kind of match will help them gain this experience. We made errors during the match and the home team's goals came from these but at the same time the players generally put into practise the tactical elements we discussed prior to the match".

Azerbaijan 3-3 Hungary (HT: 0-2)

Hungary (surnames first): Zima Ádám (Tóth Balázs, 46.) - Pávkovics Bence (Szabó Norman, 64.), Kecskés Ákos, Szalai Attila (Gergényi Bence, 46.) - Hinora Kristóf, Hursán György (Schafer András, 56.), Haris Attila, Tajti Mátyás (Szabó Bence, 56.), Banó-Szabó Bence (Forgács Péter, 46.) - Makrai Gábor, Kundrák Norbert