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Are you ready? The 2016 European Championship Final is this afternoon in Paris. After a month of constant international football, it’s down to the hosts France against Cristiano Ronaldo and Portugal.
It’s a major tournament final, so I have no idea what to expect. Portugal have been underwhelming at times in this tournament, but they’ve done enough to get here, and that makes them formidable, despite coming from the “lesser” half of the bracket. Cristiano Ronaldo is Cristiano Ronaldo, of course, and this has also been the coming out party for Renato Sanchez. You’d be fooling yourself if you didn’t give Portugal a chance to win this match.
On the other hand, France has been fantastic this tournament, and Hugo Lloris has been amazing for Les Blues. How awesome would it be for Hugo to come back to Tottenham with a Euro Championship title to his name? Pretty freakin’ awesome.
The worst thing that could happen, and this does happen in a lot of international finals, is for both clubs to come out and play defensive and cautious. That makes for a boring game and a possible 0-0 penalty shootout victory for one of them. It’s happened before. Let’s hope it doesn’t happen this time. Go out and go for it, France and Portugal.
Your open thread is below.
How to Watch
Portugal vs. France -- Stade de France, Saint-Denis, Paris (9 p.m. CET/3 p.m. ET)
TV: ESPN (USA), ESPN Deportes (USA - Spanish), BBC 1 / ITV 1 (UK), TSN (Canada), beIn Sports (Australia), other countries at livesoccertv.com
Streaming: ESPN3/WatchESPN (USA), BBC iPlayer / ITV Hub (UK)
Radio: BBC Radio 5Live, TalkSport
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