Paper Monitor
11:53 UK time, Wednesday, 4 June 2008
A service highlighting the riches of the daily press.
Eyes pop. Tension mounts. Hearts pound. Teeth grind. It's always a fraught affair when one's national team takes to the pitch and, inevitably, attempts to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory.
So no moaning about how none of the UK's flag carriers have made it into Euro 2008 - just relax and enjoy the beautiful game, says Martin Samuels of the Times, who argues that this tournament will be good for those old-fashioned enough to simply love a good game.
But a big event is about so much more than just the sporting action. Buy the shirt, the flag, beat the chest, feel the partisan pain and glory. "That is why newspapers have been full of articles on who to support," says Samuels.
Including his own - yesterday Simon Barnes adopted Turkey because his favourite book is by a Turkish author, Carol Midgley opted for Spain because of pretty-boy Fernando Torres, and Caitlin Moran chose Austria because, well, someone had to.
The Guardian threw the question open to its readers, conducting a poll from a shortlist of Germany, the Netherlands, Romania, Sweden and Spain, complete with celebrity endorsements and a vote rigged by the Dutch, who garnered 96% of the vote. Since they would have won without cheating, the paper decided not to disqualify the team.
Regular readers will know that the Independent has no truck with rigged votes, and so has devised an elaborate biometric test to determine which team to support, with questions such as "Do you follow the throng... rate yourself on a sliding scale from 1 to 16 where 1 = entirely populist and 16 = utterly on the margins".
One can safely assume that for the Sun it will be whoever is playing Germany on the day.
So who will those at Monitor Towers be supporting? Why, San Marino, the tiny nation that is home to just three Britons and that gave us points in Eurovision. It's the least we can do... what do you mean they're not in the European Championships either?!?
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