Season Special - Euros 2024

At the end of the first season, we have hit the time for the Euro's. Will England be able to find success and go one step further than they did in real life? Will Spain regain their real life title? Will Italy be able to defend their championship this time? Or could we get a real surprise winner to really mix things up. We will have to wait and see and find out, but feel free to have a think who you believe could be winners this tournament.

The Draw

So with the teams being split into 6 groups of 4, it is decided that the top 2 of each group will qualify for the knockout rounds alongside the 4 best 3rd place finishes out of the 6. So to make predictions I'm just going to pick who I believe will finish top 2. In Group A, I'd say we're looking at Germany and either Poland or Sweden. Group B I'll go with Croatia and Austria but this is quite an open group. Group C I would imagine England and Norway will have the players to go through there. Group D I'm looking at France and Serbia. Group E would be Portugal and Spain, but also Belgium could throw themselves in the mix with a good result against either of them. Probably the hardest group to call actually that one. Then finally Group F where I'd be looking at Italy and Netherlands to qualify. Let's see how our predictions went vs the reality.

Group Stages

So with the first 3 groups, it's safe to say some of my predictions were a little off. Germany did win Group A as expected, but were followed by Turkey with Poland taking one of the 3rd place qualifiers. Sweden had a poor group stage despite having some good players in their squad currently.

Group B was comfortably won by Austria, but Wales have managed to sneak their way through at the expense of Croatia and Czech Republic, two teams you would have said on paper were stronger than the Welsh team.

Group C went fully as predicted, with England topping the group with Norway in second, but Denmark miss out on the 3rd place qualifier to go out completely with Montenegro.

In the second set of groups my predictions were a bit closer to what happened. In Group D France expectedly won all 3 of their games, and joined in the next round by Serbia as well as Romania who finished 3rd. In Group E we said was a tough group to call, however we didn't expect Slovakia to qualify from it and thought they were all but out. Instead they join Portugal in automatic qualification, whilst Spain sneak through with the 3rd place qualification and Belgium go out completely. In the final group it was as expected for the top 2, with Italy and Netherlands both qualifying. However Finland stole 3rd place from Switzerland and also qualify for the knock out rounds.

The first knockout round is drawn and we've got some interesting games to look forward to. The first that come to my eye is France vs Netherlands, Wales vs Turkey and Slovakia vs Serbia. This looks like at least one of the bigger teams is going to go out early, whilst 2 out of 4 unlikely teams are guaranteed a place in the next round.

Second Round

Unfortunately the second round didn't throw up too many surprises, although there was one big upset amongst them. Serbia were able to beat Slovakia in their close match to go through, where they will meet Poland who completely smashed Italy in the surprise result of the round. The next quarter final was set up between Spain and Germany, as Spain knocked out Austria on penalties and Germany were able to squeeze through past Norway in extra time. The third quarter final is set to be England vs Turkey, thanks to England comfortably beating Finland 3-0, and Turkey needing extra time to get a 2-1 victory over Wales. The final quarter final has been set as Portugal vs France, as Portugal beat Romania 1-0 and France came out on top of the big team showdown where they been Netherlands 1-0. The fact that either Serbia or Poland are going to be in the semi final is great!

Quarter Final

The quarters had been pretty hard stacked with some of the biggest countries in Europe still in it, so it was hard to really say any of these were upsets due to them all being evenly balance, other than England vs Turkey which you would imagine was England favoured. As the games played out the semi finals were set up for some interesting ties. First up Poland continued their run into the tournament as they beat Serbia 3-2, and they'll meet Spain on the back of a 3-1 victory over Germany. You've got to imagine Spain are the favourites going into that one now. The other semi final is set up as England beat Turkey 2-1 quite comfortably, and they'll meet France after their penalty shootout victory over Portugal. Will these tough fixtures hinder France against England, or does it set them up to go all the way whilst winning against the hard opponents each round.

Semi Final

As the pressure ramps up to decide the final for the Euros, Poland do not crack and throw up another major shock result. After knocking out Italy and Serbia, they have now knocked out Spain in a 2-0 victory to get to the final of the Euros. Could the dream happen or will it be on strong team too many in the final game? The other team to make it through was France, as they now add England's scalp to their list of teams to knock out of the tournament on their run to the final. They couldn't have had a much tougher set of fixtures if they tried, but they've found their way through beating Netherlands, Portugal and now England. Who do you think will win the final?

The Final

It is set, the winners of the Euros 2024 are France! A very comfortable final for them in the end where they got a 4-1 victory. The goals coming from Kante, Kolo Muani and 2 from Tel, whilst Poland's goal came through Lewandowski in the 90th minute. I have to say a very deserving champion based on the run they had to the final, but what a credit to the tournament Poland have been to make it this far!

Full Tournament Tree

The Awards

Dream Team

Hardly surprising to see the dream team had a fair few French players in there, but was surprisingly dominated by the English players. Despite Poland's great run only 1 of their players was deemed good enough for the first 11 of the dream team but they did get 2 more in the listings. I think what makes it even more surprising is that the player they did have get in the starting 11, plays for Birmingham City! 32 year old Gudelj also made it into the starting 11 for Serbia, who currently plays for Sevilla, so I'm not sure the defence of the tournament was the best thing this year.

Player of the Tournament

The Euros 2024 best player award goes to Bukayo Saka. Hardly surprising when the 22 year old has scored 6 and got 4 assists in just 6 appearances throughout the tournament, meaning when he was on the pitch he made sure it counted.

Young Player of the Tournament

Hardly surprising that if Saka won the Best Player, he qualified for the Young Player award too and was always going to win that to give himself the double of the personal awards. What a tournament for star boy!

Top Goalscorer

Saka makes it a hat trick of awards being the tournament top goalscorer as well. Mbappe came 2nd with 5 goals and Kane was 3rd also with 5 goals. So despite France winning the tournament overall, the standout players do seem to be within the England team, which makes you wonder just how did France manage to beat them in their semi final when they were in this much form.

Next Time

So up next we will have the beginning to season 2. We will go over the transfer updates for the new season, a quick look at how the preseason went and there should be a couple of games at the start of the league played as well due to going through until the end of the transfer window. We have had a big window so far I can promise you that, so have a think about what players you'd have liked to see brought in based on the positions we mentioned last time, and see if you get any of them correct.