Euro 2024 seems unlikely to follow the pattern of Euro 2020. When Italy and England met in the last European Championship, it was that rarest of things: the two best teams in the tournament to that point actually both made it to the final to go head-to-head. This year, that already looks impossible.
That especially came home to us when compiling our power rankings of the remaining teams in the last 16 of the tournament. Spain and Germany were the obvious top two, but the field beyond that was very much of a muchness – and those two leading candidates were drawn such that they could face one another as early as the quarter-finals. So who else is there? Portugal had looked unconvincing against the Czech Republic and lost to Georgia but we still had no real choice but to put them third.
France still haven’t got firing, yet were right behind them in fourth purely by default. We put England sixth, largely on the basis of ‘well, at least their defence hasn’t been total crap even if everything else has’ . Why Germany Have Been The Best Team At Euro 2024 (So Far) Is Euro 2024 turning into Euro 2004? We’d be exaggerating if we said that tournament has been something of a footballing spring for some of the unfancied contenders.
Switzerland have been slowly but steadily improving for the better part of 20 years, going from group stage fodder to consistent last 16ers to now two-time Euros quarter-finalists. Austria’s potential under Ralf Rangnick had not gone unnoticed by t.