Bring on the Euros 2020! Better Late Than Never

And so, here we are. UEFA Euro 2000, otherwise known as the UEFA European Football Championships (soccer to you) or just plain old Euros (shorter, simpler and easier to remember), is finally underway.

The month-long 24-team tournament, which in theory will decide the best national football team in Europe, is being played in several countries across Europe, in front of controlled groups of several thousand fans in each stadium, with the final set for Sunday, July 11 at London’s Wembley Stadium.

That’s just as well, because England won’t win.

In fact, England will be lucky to reach the semifinal, which they did at the 2018 World Cup in Russia, largely on the luck of the draw.

In that World Cup, when England finally faced a decent side — Croatia — they lost. Handily.

To put that in perspective, Croatia faced France in the final. Croatia lost. Handily.

England faced another decent side in the 3rd place game, Belgium. They lost again. Handily.

And yet, if we’re to believe elements of the English press — think the New York Post, then go lower — England are going into the Euros with the finest team in the history of human civilization. They beat San Marino in qualifying — San Marino! — then dismissed an under-strength Austria side 1-0 in a pre-tournament “friendly” at home, in front of home fans. Incredibly, a number of those fans who booed players who took the knee at kickoff. Taking the knee has become a familiar demonstration of support across the English Premier League for the league’s “Kick it Out” anti-racism campaign. We’re not racists, the fans protested, booing loudly. We just want to get on with the game. Leave political statements for outside!

Never mind that the anti-racism movement is not a political campaign but rather a social movement based on humanity, fairness and simple common decency, but nevermind.)

England manager Gareth Southgate for his part has said: Well, fine then, we’re going to take the knee before every single game we play at the Euros.

Other national sides may or may not follow.

It’s going to come down to each country’s conscience. Scotland, for example, in England’s round-robin group — no history there — have said they will leave it to the players to decide.

Interestingly, the game itself has become a demonstration of diversity, in that virtually every side in the tournament is multi-racial in makeup, even sides you might assume to be uniformly Caucasian, like Sweden, Denmark and Switzerland.

The fact is, players should not stay away from politics. It’s good to try and make the world a better place. Playing for your national team is a dream for many children the world over, boys and girls. More than a few players, men and women alike, have said that when you pull on the shirt for your national team and play for a whole country, in front of the entire world on TV, you’re playing your part in bringing the whole country together, even if it’s only for four short weeks.

Players do not necessarily ask to be placed on a pedestal, but the truth is, when given a platform in front of the entire world, some players choose to raise larger issues — such as racism — that affect society as a whole.

England, to their credit, are one of the most racially diverse sides in the entire tournament, but the point is virtually every team this side of Croatia is a racial mix.

Bottom line: The Euros are big. Really big.

From a purely technical point of view, the quality of play is arguably better than that in the World Cup, at least in the early group stage, because there are no absurdly weak sides. The World Cup reflects the entire world, and the plain truth is that the game is played better and taken more seriously on some continents than others. The countries represented in the Euros are all solid technically. They had to work hard to get there, by beating other, similarly strong sides along the way. There are no easy games in this tournament, even in the first week. You won’t find Germany v. Saudi Arabia here, or France v. Fiji.

What you may find is England v. Iceland, and while that may look on paper as if it would be a wash, you’d be mistaken to think so. This actually happened, at the 2016 Euros. Iceland won. England have yet to get over the shame. The horror. The horror.

Iceland meanwhile — the entire country, whose entire population would fit comfortably inside London, partied long into the night, which in midsummer, at that latitude, is still daylight.

(For the record, for those who are unaware, England may claim they invented the professional game, back in the late 1800s, but they have won just one World Cup, in 1966.)

And that, in a nutshell, is what’s so appealing about the Euros.

Even for those who care little for soccer, or football, or whatever you choose to call it, the European Football Championships is an endless source of fascination, full of talking points, whether it be national bragging rights or the uncanny way national sides often reflect the personality of their home country, to the glorious sight of the world’s most popular, widely played game being played at the highest, most elite level of sport.

Here’s a quick cheat sheet of the next four weeks. These are just my opinions, mind, but my opinion is no worse — or better — than anyone else’s, including those pundits who picked England to run up the score against Iceland in 2016.

France are the favourites, and not just because they won the World Cup, three years ago. France are arguably better this time around, because the young players they started with in Russia in 2018 are now three years older, three years wiser.

Portugal are a decent pick, if not favourites exactly, and Belgium have been knocking at the door for several years now.

Germany, normally a powerhouse — they don’t call them the Mannschaft for nothing — are a fading force, as are Spain, who gave the world tiki-taka. (Even if you don’t know what tiki-taka is, you can guess from the name alone. Think Tic-Tac-Toe, then translate it to soccer.)

Denmark are rated a fair bet for an outside pick.

As with any tournament, though, whoever reaches the final often comes down to the luck of the draw in the knockout phase, which begins in the round-of-16 on June 26 and 27.

There are six groups of four. The top two finishers in each group automatically move to the final 16. The remaining four slots are taken up by the 3rd place teams with the most points — three points for a win, one for a draw. (A good rule that, because in encourages teams to go for the win, and not pack the back line in hopes of eking out a draw. There have been teams that went undefeated in the group phase, but were eliminated based on having too many draws. Three draws — three points — is equal to one win, but a team with just one win will finish ahead of the undefeated team based on won-loss record. It’s actually less complicated than it sounds.)

The Euros are exciting because, much like the World Cup, the eventual winner often loses one of its early games, causing that country’s media — and fans — to panic like there’s no tomorrow. The English press do panic very well, and if history teaches us anything at these big tournaments, it’s that England fall apart under pressure. Much like Holland, aka the Netherlands.

England already face a huge hurdle, based on the draw. They’re likely to top their group, or finish second — surely — in a group that includes Scotland, Croatia and the Czech Republic.

It’s after that that things get tricky. If England wins its group, and if the other early rounds go to form, England would face Portugal, France or Germany in the round-of-16. Any one of those three can beat England, and beat them badly. This is a problem because the round-of-16 is a knockout round: One loss and you’re out.

If England finish 2nd in their group, which is entirely possible — Croatia reached the World Cup final in 2018, after all, and beat England soundly to get there — England could potentially face Spain who, while fading, are still capable of doing real damage.

In any team sport, though, the winner at the end of a long slugfest is often the team with a history of winning, whether it’s Brazil on the world stage or one of the continental teams on the European stage. Italy had its turn. Germany had its turn. Spain has its turn. And now it’s . . . .

Vive la France.