Euro 2012 in headlines, including Wayne Rooney as a Venetian gondola man, an homage to a classic chocolate and telling Angela Merkel to.....

The European Championships in Poland and Ukraine was more than just another football tournament.

As it also gifted the tabloids the chance to play with new names, exciting foreign locations and a host of nations that wouldn’t usually grab the headlines.

And added to this was the financial frailty of a number of countries playing in the tournament and their political relationship to each other, giving the tabloids a whole new range of subjects to pun with.

So, here is the European Championships in headlines.

Wednesday 2nd May

Even before the commencement of the competition, The Sun began the offensive on the newly appointed England manager. In the absence of a private life amazingly strewn with scantily clad minor celebrities, a penchant for golf umbrellas and fabricated English accents, or a mediocre grasp of the language, the tabloid was left with little else with which to assert themselves over the new appointment. Bless ‘em.

Tuesday 19th June

Wayne Rooney surprisingly did as what was suggested of him and this was in spite of his turgid summer performance. And it was the London Evening Standard who helped fuel the blind belief of England fans, whilst simultaneously educating them as to the location of their crunch Group D clash with the co-hosts Ukraine.

Wednesday 20th June

Two years after a contentious decision denied Frank Lampard and England a consolation goal in Bloemfontein against a rampant Germany side, Ukraine’s Marko Devic was similarly denied what replays showed to be a clear goal, despite the efforts of John Terry. The Hungarian team of officials also managed to miss an offside call in the run up to the incident, but at no point did they have any influence over The Metro’s strange homage to a classic chocolate in their front page headline.

Freitag 22nd Juni

Greece vs. Germany isn’t usually a fixture that grabs the headlines. However, such is the financial and economic significance of the meeting between the two countries at differing ends of the European power scale that whatever the result the German tabloid paper Bild was always likely to react. Roughly translated it read ‘bye Greece, today we can’t save you!’ Also featured was a snap of Rafael and Sylvie van der Vaart engaging in an act that certainly isn’t permitted in my local swimming pool.

Saturday 23rd June

The opportunity to combine current affairs and sport is just too much for some red tops to resist. And the The Sun is no different, as they undoubtedly had a slew of ready-made headline prepared for the quarter-final, but decided to plump for the easiest and most popularly accessible. Throw in some minor celebrity gossip and a money spinning-voucher to a theme park and they’d be in populist heaven.

Sunday 24th June

England’s match-up against Italy was potentially a blessing in disguise, with the alternative being a game against the World and European Champions Spain. As it happens it didn’t make too much difference, as the gulf between the two sides was clear for all to see, but that didn’t stop the Sunday Mirror offering their support before the battle with in an odd message from Wayne Rooney dressed as a stereotypical Venetian gondola man. Embarrassingly though they forgot to include a Cornetto in their depiction.

Monday 25th June

Not usually known for their fondness of puns The Times took a break from their normal descriptive headers to commiserate yet another penalty shoot-out defeat for England with a delicate play on words. The tabloid-in-a-suit even managed to avoid the temptation to front their backpage with Cr-Ash, in honour of miss-hitters Ashley Young and Cole.

Venerdì 29th Giugno

Some headlines can be witty, some are informative or educational and some are just fucking blunt. They don’t dance with subtlety and only express the immediate feelings of fans and commentators, something which the Italian newspaper Libero reflected in their direct message for German chancellor Angela Merkel following Italy’s defeat of one of the competition’s favourites. And I for one sympathise with them, as telling Merkel to fuck off is pretty good fun, irrespective of any political leanings.

Tags: England, Germany, Italy, Spain, UEFA Euro 2012

Share this article

Tweet