BERLIN — Come Sunday night, it will be done. Spain’s collection of wonderkids, comeback kids and kids-at-heart, under the watchful eye of everyone’s favorite substitute teacher, coach Luis de la Fuente, will have delivered the country Euro 2024, a European crown for three out of the past five tournaments.
Or England, having already made the transition from tragicomic self-destructors to nearly men (this is their second straight Euro final, and they also reached the World Cup semifinals in 2018) will take that final step into the history books and win a major tournament, something they haven’t achieved since 1966 (and even that one, to most, came with an asterisk.
Either way, there will be an air of finality to it and international football will largely go back on the cupboard shelf until 2026 and the three-host, 48-country extravaganza of the World Cup in the United States, Mexico and Canada. The cycle of top-end club football is relentless: the first qualifying round of the 2024-25 Champions League was played last week; the game’s heavyweights are packing for their summer tours; and already, outside of the two finalists’ countries, transfer stories are pushing the Euros to the margins.)