We already lost the first half...

Swiss Watches. It was on them that in the first week of Euro 2008 the favorites predictably beat the non-favorites - measuredly and inexorably. How many had to be scored in 90 minutes, so many were scored. The Portuguese - to the Turks, the Germans - to the Poles, the Spaniards - to ours

True, it seems to you that the Spaniards stuffed Russia a little too much - after Pavlyuchenko's goal, everything could have stopped at least 1:3. No obvious destruction. But the frisky Spaniards played in the end for no reason, not to keep the advantage, but to develop it - they ran, clogged, so why restrain yourself? For some reason, they didn’t have our usual weights on their feet.

Football in hockey country

And we, of course, were upset, especially against the backdrop of the unrelenting euphoria after the Canadian victory of the hockey players. By the way, did you notice for an hour who treated her the most reservedly? Guus Hiddink, who said before leaving for Euro 2008 that five or six countries play hockey at a serious level, plays approximately on an equal footing, and if you are your own in this clip, then there is nothing surprising in turning your bronze medals into gold ones.

The Dutchman, of course, is not the largest hockey analyst (in his homeland, this game is generally played on roller skates), but he is right. And if you dig a little deeper: in the mid-nineties, children's coaches in hockey were paid the same pennies as their comrades in misfortune in football, but for some reason this did not stop them from raising the Kovalchuks, Ovechkins, Malkins, as a decade before the Mogilny, Bure and Fedorov . And the poster of the finals of the youth world championships was rewritten from the USSR - Canada to Russia - Canada. Yes, the Canadians now beat ours more often, but the final is just one match, you have to reach it with the whole tournament, and the Russians reach it every time. And sometimes they win. And the best player in the best league in the world, the NHL, today is Ovechkin, and the final of their legendary Stanley Cup is played by teams where the ringleaders are Malkin and Datsyuk. This is the kind of hockey country we are.

Waiting for a miracle

In the current Russian football team, one person plays in a decent European championship - Ivan Saenko. He plays for the German Nuremberg, which this year flew out of the Bundesliga to the second division: so today Vanya is not in the elite either. And in the Spanish championship, our top scorer in the qualifying for the Euro tournament, Alexander Kerzhakov, spent more than a year on the Sevilla bench and returned home in such a state that Hiddink did not even take him to the national team from Dynamo. We saw in our opening match how those with whom Kerzh could not stand the competition play in that championship. Remember the commercial: feel the difference...

So it was in vain that we almost sent this team to win in Austria with Switzerland: it remained the same as it was a group stage team (the last places in the group at the last two European Championships in which it participated). And Hiddink has not done any such miracle with her yet. And that Zenit recently won the UEFA Cup here, so the whole game is built through the Ukrainian Tymoshchuk, Arshavin, who was disqualified for an idiotic go-ahead back in Andorra, who injured Pogrebnyak's knee and Zyryanov, who is somehow not a leader in the national team without club partners. At least against the backdrop of the teams that came to this championship to really achieve something serious.

Championship Logic

In general, it is very logical, it is a championship. For the first week, it's even too much. There are those for whom playing in groups is a warm-up: Portugal, Holland, Spain.

There are those who have to get out of it, straining more: Czechs, French, Swedes. There is, as usual, a team of joy, for which any match in a buzz is the Croats.

There are Germans who only lose when it's not scary to lose.

There is always a favorite who failed, who fell into a group where there were more than two top teams - this was Italy at the start.

And even in the loss of Turkey, which is tragic for Switzerland, there is quite a logic of its own: the Swiss have been living by their own hours for centuries, by the right ones: according to their forever established concepts, the match lasts strictly an hour and a half. And in Turkey, relations over time are simpler, they do not notice any limits. So they scored a goal on the ninety-third ...