All Together Now?

Even though I’ve been in the UK for almost 16 months now, I confess I haven’t really taken to football like I thought I might. When it comes to league football (SPL, English Premiership) I care about the games as much as I do for British reality TV programmes (which is to say not at all). However, it’s a slightly different situation when it comes to international play. You get the impression that the games actually mean something when an entire country comes together to support their national team. The nationwide euphoria or shock and sadness (depending on the result) is undeniable. While I’m well aware of the more dubious aspects of patriotism, it is thrilling to see a country’s supporters out en masse with flags and banners, singing their national anthem with teary-eyed pride.

That said, we are now into the knockout rounds of Euro 2004, and I had yet to really get into the tournament (Scotland never qualified after all). But that changed Thursday night when I was convinced to grab a few pints and watch England v Portugal in a quarterfinal match. And what a bloody game that turned out to be! Tied at one each nearing the end of 90 minutes, England scores what appears to be a legit goal but is disallowed by the referee. The game goes into overtime and each team score another goal apiece, but nothing is settled by the end of the additional 30 minutes so we go into penalty shots (always a nail-biter). David Beckham is up first and makes a spectacularly horrible shot that sends the ball flying well over the goal post. After five shots each we still don’t have a result. The game is settled by – of all unlikely people – the Portuguese goalkeeper who after saving England’s 6th shot, left the goal to score the winner.

I was sitting with a group of English supporters who were not happy. They, and the papers the next day, blamed everything from dodgy refereeing to Beckham to uneven turf for the penalty shots. But at the end of the day, England is out. Which made for many gleeful Scots (Fiona among them). All the other big teams are now out too - Italy, Germany, Spain and France. Based on my newfound enthusiasm for Euro 2004, I watched Greece score the upset over Les Bleues at the pub last night. While not as exciting as the England game (how do you beat that?), it was still a fun 93 minutes. Fiona is convinced the Czech Republic will win. She might just be right.