The European Championships are in full swing not only on the pitch but off it too. In Part 1, we pick out three themes from the opening stages of the tournament in Germany that have made us laugh: food wars, culture craziness & online polls/searches. Tune in to find out which country at EURO 2024 has the best national dish, who is empirically speaking the sexiest of the 24 head coaches, why Niklas Füllkrug has the best ‘Personal life’ section on Wikipedia and why Ralf Rangnick has taken the Austria squad to a Rod Stewart concert in Berlin.
 
The focus is on club football in Part 2, with three amazing
stories from Portugal, Japan and Iceland. Why could a Santa Clara player’s tattoo to commemorate winning the Portuguese second division prove to be premature? How has a university team managed to pull off one of the biggest upsets in the history of the Emperor’s Cup in Japan? And will lower-league Icelandic club FC Reynir, who are based at the foot of a volcano, get the home cup tie they have been dreaming of for 30 years?
 
For Part 3 and some international football headlines from three other continents, join us over on Patreon at patreon.com/SweeperPod. Why is 16-year-old Bolivian wonderkid Moisés Paniagua unable to travel to the Copa America in the United States? What emotional moment of unity took place at the world’s newest international football derby between Sudan and South Sudan? And why has Singapore’s 40-year-old goalkeeper Hassan Sunny had to beg Chinese football fans to stop sending him money?
 
RUNNING ORDER:

00:00 – Intro
00:40 – EURO 2024 – Christmas for adults
03:40 – EURO 2024 culture craziness
07:02 – EURO 2024 food wars
11:15 – EURO 2024 online polls & searches
15:57 – Guest podcast appearances
17:52 – A tattoo mishap in Portugal
22:01 – A university upset in Japan
27:29 – An Icelandic village dream
34:53 – Listener emails
 
Podcast guest appearances:
Lee on The Totally Show: https://open.spotify.com/episode/6npASOQ1BZPvYYFpnb4ssE
Paul on Guardian Football Weekly: https://open.spotify.com/episode/2uu1QCQC1vH2ISK8euq8kj
Lee on The Window: https://open.spotify.com/episode/4tPj0TvQ5NQfN6CcQPDOCA
Paul on World of CONCACAF: https://open.spotify.com/episode/24hiIr0iqUW7MSEKGnY5ol