Main highlights of EURO 2024: triumph of the best, eventful tournament, and farewells (review)

2024-07-17 16:15 © ZUMAPRESS.com

A few days have passed since the European Championship. So, it is possible to draw conclusions and highlight the key accents.

The best team won. In national team championships, it is far from always the team that looks the best or plays the most beautiful football that wins, but this time, at the 2024 European Football Championship, it happened exactly that way. Spain looked great from the very beginning, on their way to the champion's title, they defeated teams like Italy, Croatia, Germany, France, England. They played beautiful and best football, which was once again confirmed in the final. Commentator Rytis Vyšniauskas also enjoyed this tournament ending.

The best team won a knockout competition. This makes me so so happy.

— Rytis Vysniauskas (@Ryxa41) July 14, 2024

A well-paced tournament that slowed down at some point. This European Championship started off well, its beginning and especially the first round captivated many spectators. In the first round, 33 goals were scored, in the second 23, and in the decisive group stage - only 19. Such productivity raises many questions about the format of the European Championship, as there were many calculations, even too many, at the end of the group stage. However, we will look at the format of the European Championship a little later. The knockout rounds of football beauty also started a bit slowly, but the semifinals and final had to leave no one indifferent - it was beautiful and dramatic football, with goals.

Farewells. As always, a championship of this scale is the last farewell with their national teams for some footballers. Jan Vertonghen, Xherdan Shaqiri, Thomas Muller, Pepe ended their careers in the national team. The future of Cristiano Ronaldo, Manuel Neuer, Luka Modric in their national teams remains uncertain.

The best. Lamine Yamalis was named the best young player of EURO 2024, and the best player of the championship in general was the defender of the Spanish national team.

Tournament goal. UEFA awarded Lamine Yamali the second award for his stunning strike against the French national team.

🚨🚨| 𝐎𝐅𝐅𝐈𝐂𝐈𝐀𝐋: Lamine Yamal's strike vs France has been named EURO 2024 Goal of the Tournament! 🇪🇦🚀 pic.twitter.com/d3HdbMR1qC

— CentreGoals. (@centregoals) July 16, 2024

Golden Boot. UEFA decided to award the "Golden Boot" to the top three scorers. It was awarded to Ivan Schranzas (Slovakia), Georges Mikautadze (Georgia), Harry Kane (England), Cody Gakpo (Netherlands), Jamal Musiala (Germany), Dani Olmo (Spain) - all scoring 3 goals each.

Tournament team. UEFA announced the symbolic European Championship team, where the candidacy of Kyle Walker raised the most questions. Instead of an Englishman, fans wanted to see Frenchman Jules Kounde or Spaniard Dani Carvajal. However, in that case, there would be no English players who played in the final. Spanish defenders and attackers definitely deserve their place, as well as Musiala, who truly stood out in this championship. However, it should be considered whether Dutch leader Cody Gakpo was also worthy of his place.

👕✨ Introducing the UEFA EURO 2024 Team of the Tournament, as selected by UEFA's Technical Observer panel.#EURO2024 pic.twitter.com/ITp3ipcWxF

— UEFA EURO 2024 (@EURO2024) July 16, 2024

The next European Football Championship will take place in 4 years. It will be hosted by Great Britain and Ireland, from June 9 to July 9, preliminarily.