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The month-long European Football Championship has ended. "Euro 2020" was crowned with the triumph of the Italian national team, when Roberto Mancini's players continued their streak of 34 unbeaten matches, defeating the English national team in the final after a penalty shootout. While the official winner of this championship is only one - the Italian national team, nicknamed "Azzuri," there were both winners and losers. Eurofootball.com offers you to take a look at the championship and see how each team fared in this European football festival - from teams that could draw both positive and negative things.
Winners - Switzerland, Ukraine Both teams finished in 3rd place in their groups, but they still managed to advance to the knockout stages and left a mark. Switzerland sensationally eliminated the favorites of the European Football Championship, the French, from the tournament, playing a 3-3 draw in regular time and managing to come back from a 1-3 deficit. They won the penalty shootout against France and sensationally reached the quarterfinals, which was historical for them, winning an elimination match for the first time in the European championship. In the quarterfinals, success was also within reach - Switzerland lost to Spain in another penalty shootout.
Ukraine, undoubtedly, can also take away a lot from this tournament. At one point, it seemed that they wouldn't even advance from the group after a poor game and a loss against Austria, but eventually, the Ukrainians reached the quarterfinals - something they had never done before. Both Switzerland and Ukraine truly won in this championship.
Losers - Russia, Turkey, Poland The teams that everyone was expecting a lot from before this championship but achieved very little. Turkey did not win a single match and only managed to score one goal, conceding 8. There is not much more to say - their game was very poor.
On the other hand, the Russian national team gathered 3 points, but this is a pretty poor result considering they played two games at home. For some reason, in this championship, the Russians decided to use three different goalkeepers for all the matches, and they didn't inspire much. In short - the Russian national team played poorly in the matches.
Poland continued to waste Roberto Lewandowski's golden years. The Bayern forward did quite well in this championship, scoring 3 great goals, but Poland failed to advance from the group stage. Another attempt with this generation may come in 2022 in Qatar. But in this championship, everything was decided by the loss to Slovakia, when the situation became very complicated.
Winners - Semi-finalists - England, Spain, Denmark, Italy The Spaniards, even though they won the European Championship nine years ago, still should be pleased with this semifinal appearance. A new generation is growing, and wanting to win all championships right away would be a bit too ambitious. And everyone should have seen and admired the fantastic talent that Spain has - Pedri.
There is not much to say about England, they lacked just a few accurate penalties from complete success, and this was their first European Championship final in their history. A good achievement worthy of respect.
Denmark - the dark horses of this championship, who almost suffered the tragedy of C. Eriksen at the beginning of the tournament. Thankfully, the situation ended well, and after that, the Danes played such a championship in front of their own audience that it will be very pleasant to remember it. Italy, on the other hand, completely and undeniably deserved to be the champions of EURO 2020 with 34 consecutive unbeaten matches and an eye-catching game, remembering the times when their style was associated with defensive football.
Losers - Representatives of the "death" group - France, Portugal, Germany France, according to the bookmakers' predictions, was considered the main favorite of this championship, but they did not justify this status. Their game was not actually bad, but playing poorly against Switzerland was enough for the French to be eliminated from the tournament. Their leader Kylian Mbappé also did not shine in this championship, which was also a big minus for the French.
Portugal was possibly even stronger in this tournament than five years ago when they won the European Championship - this time they added the best "Premier League" player Ruben Dias and the dazzling Bruno Fernandes from the same league. However, Bruno was very disappointing. Portugal only reached the round of 16, and they did not shine in the group stage either.
The Germans also achieved a fairly poor result, barely advancing from the group stage and losing to England in the round of 16. But at the next championship, Hansi Flick will already be at the helm, which should inspire, and it seems like a very logical move by the German Football Federation.
Neutral - Finland, Slovakia, Wales For Finland, Slovaks, and Welshmen, qualifying for the European Championship was already a good achievement. Of course, the Welsh national team reached the European Championship semi-finals five years ago, but then it was a completely different team, and Gareth Bale was younger. And Wales not only achieved that - they also reached the EURO 2020 round of 16, but there they were quite shamefully defeated by Denmark, which does not allow them to evaluate this tournament as very successful. They achieved what they had to.
For the Finns, this was not a bad performance, and also a historic one - they were at the European Championship for the first time, but it could have been better, they needed to take at least one point from the Russians to secure a spot in the knockout stages, and there would have been complete euphoria in Finland. The Slovaks earned only 3 points, and they played quite poorly against the Spanish, but this championship, perhaps, will be a good ending for the golden generation of Slovaks (Hamsik, Kucka, Mak, Weiss, and others) since their path to this championship was not easy either, and reaching it is already a pleasant thing.
Winners - Hungary, North Macedonia, Austria, Czech Republic Hungary and North Macedonians should have considered this championship a complete success just because they were there. However, Hungary was not far from advancing from the "death" group, as they demonstrated a really good game and even had the opportunity to play in front of a full stadium of spectators in Budapest.
North Macedonia had their festival at this tournament as well and also stood out with the complete legend of Macedonia and that region, Goran Pandev. Austria also achieved a historic accomplishment, and they were only a little short of going further in the quarterfinals against Italy. Austrians showed a solid game throughout the tournament.
The Czech Republic is also quite obvious winners. They may not have repeated the trip from 1996, but they certainly played a great championship. They were better prepared in their group than the Croats, and unexpectedly defeated the Dutch national team in the round of 16. You could think that the arrival of the Czech club Slavia Prague on the big European stage really paid off.
Losers - Belgium, Croatia The teams that played well at the 2018 World Cup did not show anything similar this time. Belgians, although they looked quite solid, fell in the quarterfinals against Italy. The golden Belgian generation is still waiting for their gold. Meanwhile, the Croatians just looked quite sluggish, barely advancing from the group stage, and their best phase was against Spain at the end of regular time, when extra time was extended, but even that wasn't enough for them to achieve something more in this tournament.
Neutral - Scotland, Netherlands, Sweden These teams are all connected by one thing - good play during the tournament, but they failed to achieve their goals. The Scots played according to plan with the English, as getting draws with the main rivals is not a bad result. However, in other matches, they really lacked opportunities to convert, and sometimes they were punished by excellent, "unstoppable" strikes like those of Modric and Schick.
The games of the Dutch and Swedish national teams were also good, but more in the group stage. Both teams were eliminated in the round of 16, where luck clearly lacked and their goals were not achieved, even though they both finished first in their groups. But playing well is a very good thing for these still quite young national teams, which have their young future stars, so there is no need to be disappointed.
