Euro 2008 Day 1: Huge setback for the hosts and an expected win for one favourite

To be honest, the tension wasn't rising for me over the past few days. Somehow I was still in some state of shock after what happened in the final game of the Verbandsliga. Maybe this will change when Germany take action today, but I will just have to wait and see. The number of flags pinned to cars and hanging out of windows is definetely increasing over the past week and it is slowly reaching a point where I will be really annoyed by the sight of black-red-gold everywhere.

Switzerland vs Czech Republic 0-1 (Group A)
I missed the opening ceremony which is a good thing since all the heck with dancers, singers and other unimportant and surely not football related stuff is something I have no interest in. When I arrived home after a rehearsal session with A Modest Proposal me and our singer sat down and watch the game. Or at least we tried. There wasn't really that much happening on the pitch and the only things I remmeber of the first half was a shot by some Swiss player from far range and the injury of Swiss striker Alexander Frei. This is extremely sad because Frei just recently recovered from a knee injury and was doing pretty well in the closing matches for Borussia Dortmund in the Bundesliga.
His teammates looked like they were trying to get the win for him in the 2nd half and the created some chances, but it were the Czech team to score the only goal. The Czechs weren't convincing at all and you could really se that they are lacking the creativity of Pavel Nedved and Tomas Rosicky. All in all it was to a certain extent a typical opening match with both sides still trying to find their pace.

Portugal vs Turkey 2-0 (Group A)
This seemed to be different for the match between Turkey and Portugal, but I have to be honest: I didn't see a single moment of this one, because I was out watching The Gaslight Anthem play in Cologne. From what I've read and heard it must have been a pretty convincing victory for Portugal although Christiano Ronaldo - who everyone expects and predicts to be THE star player of this tournament - didn't seem to have his best day. His teammates stood up for him and secured the win, which gave all of us a quite night. Because every time a Turkish side wins something the community completely loses its mind and starts going crazy. So this leaves Portugal in first place after the first day and they seem to look like a sure shot to advance to the next round.