Plus ca change la meme chose

Another tournament, another location and still you could almost write the script.

A jittery performance by the hosts, but they saw out a win thanks to a cracking goal from West Ham boy Dimitri Payet, that had TLF running upstairs to relay the bon news to a sulking Mr TLF whose judgement on the game by then was, “beaucoup de tosh.” Was relieved that my mangling of the Marseillaise earlier that day to a French colleague hadn’t jinxed anything – she tells me that she heard me singing words that she never even knew were in her national anthem…TLF French scholar.

Mr TLF has proved that he hasn’t given enough attention to his pre-tournament build up:
“What are we doing today?””
“Watching football.”
“But there’s not football all day?”
“Well 2pm, 5pm and 8pm.”
“We don’t have to watch all 3 games do we? And where do you think you are going with that blu tac and wallchart?”

TLF feigns a slight problem with her oreilles and buries self in a Euro 2016 guide.

Satday proved to be a financially depressing day as the betting slips of shame pile (a new interactive and bank account draining feature in 2016) grew in a similar way to a Lens slagheap. There was much to admire on the pitch however with Gareth Bale writing his own script only to be overshadowed by Hal Robson-Kanu’s late winner. This game also had probably the best range of hairstyles with Bale’s flowing locks, Ramsey’s peroxide blond and some excellent mohicans from the Slovakians. A little more effort on the tournament cheveux from some other teams would not go amiss. Slovakia, who I think could get out of this group also provided the first comedy name moments. Weiss could certainly have put more effort in – bit of an idle weiss if you ask us (thanks Iain). And I really hoped Mac would get sent off so we could tell him to get his coat (there’s weeks of this yet!).

As for Ingurland? Some lovely football in the first half and still only one point to show for it. We have the two leading strikers from the Prem in that squad – should one be taking the corners and the other one be on the bench? Perhaps now we do have a Plan B. Just the wrong Plan B.

And if that outcome wasn’t depressing enough for your average Ingurland follower we had the 3 days of incidents involving a small proportion of morons from more than one nation (aided and abetted methinks by some less than strategic security work) behaving like utter tw*ts. Some things really don’t change at all and I am not sure what effect the threat of England and Russia being expelled from the tournament will have on these people – no evidence to date that rational thought applies.

Sunday bought some redemption in the form of a TLF treble. TLF’s jig of joy around the living room when Poland scored against Northern Ireland might have seemed a little harsh but pecuniary advantage trumps home loyalty every time.

Talking of Les Iles Britanniques today sees the final member of the British Isles quartet get up and running. Even though he has said some very foolish things lately, Martin O’God still has a lot of TLF goodwill stored up so fingers crossed there. Possibly trickier than dealing with Ibrahimovic will be the challenge of a workday and 3 fixtures. Nothing that an Ipad and set of headphones can’t deal with mes petits. And yes, all those Euro 2016 fixtures in my electronic work calendar? Purely trying to highlight external events which may affect our ability to access key stakeholders.

Whatever you do or don’t manage to sneak a viewing of – enjoy.

Les fixtures aujourd’hui
Spain v Czech Republic 2pm
Republic of Ireland v Sweden 5pm
Belgium v Italy 8pm

Weekend Results
France 2 v Romania 1
Albania 0 v Switzerland 1
Wales 2 v Slovakia 1
England 1 v Russia 1
Turkey 0 v Croatia 1
Poland 1 v Northern Ireland 0
Germany 2 v Ukraine 0

Manger ou Boire?
As Italy make their debut and to keep my fizzy cocktail theme going can I suggest an aperol spritz. Saluti!
http://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2013/jun/08/make-your-own-aperol-spritz

Le website au jour
I quite like this. It almost makes up for the Grauniad’s incredibly disappointing wall chart. I know times is hard down at York Way but come on chaps! You left TLF relying on a Murdoch production (NB – never let one’s politics and principles get in the way of a good wall chart).
http://www.theguardian.com/football/ng-interactive/2016/jun/01/euro-2016-the-complete-guide-to-every-squad-and-every-player-in-france

Fox Cousteau
I swim
Therefore I am TLF