It can also become a tremendously boring sport when you add layers of national leagues and divisions with friendlies and the exhibition games and qualifiers as they do in European professional soccer.
But once every couple of years, the haze of confusion and boredom lifts for a few weeks and I'm able to sit back and enjoy simple, fun soccer again. Sometimes, I even call it football during these lovely tournament times.
It's a bit easier to get emotionally invested in a few national teams, rather than cities with millionaire mercenaries from all over the world. There are no friendlies or exhibition games, every game matters and you can feel the immediacy in the play. They're playing for home, after all.
Yes, the Euro brings the sport of soccerball back its simple beauty, even to this ignorant North American with his hockey and baseball.
More teams, more fun
The tournament widened from 16 teams to 24 teams, so the enthusiasm level across the continent was incredibly high for this year's Euro.
There are two opposing arguments over this. One side claims this diluted the tournament's talent pool – I heard this from two people, one Portuguese and one German, both accustomed to Euro appearances.
On the other side of the argument, this new format allowed national teams to make their first appearance – either their first ever or their first in a long time – on the international soccer stage. Hungary, Albania, Iceland, Wales, and Northern Ireland all brought a unique energy to the tournament.
Maybe it wasn't pretty for those soccer aficionados, but it definitely made the game more exciting while those teams were playing.
Germany is Europe's America
I was able to get this feel around those teams' enthusiasm largely because I live in Germany. This is one of Europe's new settler countries, where more and more people are from somewhere else.
Italians, Hungarians, Portuguese, French, Turkey – almost every nation represented has a few nationals (except for Iceland, I suppose) living in Germany. They crowd the bars, cheer in the streets, and adorn their German-made cars with their national flags.
When Portugal won on Sunday night, there was shouting and honking and celebrations up and down the busy street near our flat. Being from Toronto, this is standard stuff for an international soccer tournament – especially if you live close to Little Portugal, Little Italy, or Roncesvalles – but it's nice to see in an increasingly multicultural Germany.
Soccer Mad Portugal
We were in Lisbon last week and it was difficult not to notice a rise in the usual soccer passion whenever Portugal was scheduled to play that day.
You would pass a cafe with a TV out front and it's replaying earlier matches from the tournament, usually one that Portugal won. Kids were kicking balls in the street. Adults were kicking balls in the street, while trying not to spill their beer.
When the semi-final game started, we were just finishing dinner and awaiting the bill. After a longer than usual wait for the dinner's reckoning, we looked around and saw every waiter huddled around the computer screen with rapt attention. I don't think they were studying our bill.
When the final started between Portugal and France, we were in the air returning to Germany. We landed thinking it was over. Almost every male on the plane fumbled for their phone, deactivated flight mode, and rushed to the exit when they realized the game was well into overtime.
Ode to Gabor Kiraly and the Sweatpants
This is a goalkeeper who wears sweatpants because they are more comfortable than the standard long socks. He kept Hungary in a couple of games, which is clear proof that comfort affects performance. It might be a good reason to start wearing my sweat pantaloons to the office.
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| Comfortably watching the match. |