France were always favourites to win this tie, but the way in which they won it was extraordinary. England were 1 up at the break after a Frank Lampard header from an excellent David Beckham free kick. It looked like getting even better when 18-year-old Wayne Rooney, the second youngest player ever to appear for England in a major tournament, went down in the box and won a penalty. But David Beckham's shot was spectacularly saved by the unpredictable Barthez. England survived a constant French onslaught and looked to have done enough, but the referee's decision to allow 3 minutes of injury time proved England's undoing. Zinedine Zidane, regarded by many as the best footballer in the world, scored from a spectacular free kick to make it 1-1. No less than France deserved, but worse was to come. Barely a minute later, a terrible backpass to the goalkeeper by Gerrard was intercepted by Thierry Henry, and David James dived on the loose ball but brought Henry down in the process. Zidane made it 2-1 with the resulting penalty, leaving the England players and fans stunned. It was the final kick of the match.

England can still go through to the knockout stages if they get a win and a draw from the two remaining group matches, and on the evidence of today's performance both Switzerland and Croatia are there for the taking. It hurts to lose a match when you have it in the bag right up to the 90th minute, but the England players only have themselves to blame. The best teams don't give away goals in the way England did, and nobody can say France didn't play well enough to deserve a win. England must not feel sorry for themselves - their fate remains in their hands, and they have to get on with it. 2-1 against the defending champions is no disgrace, it's the fact that they had it it the bag and gave it away that's hard to take. But, as a Chelsea fan of 30 years, I've seen it many times before.

The match did, however, pose one question I would like answered. Why was France and Chelsea midfielder Claude Makelele wearing different socks from the rest of his teammates? Theirs were mostly red with white top. His were red and white horizontal stripes. I thought there were very strict rules about wearing the correct kit in such important matches. If I can't get to sleep tonight, it won't be because of the result, it will be because I'm thinking about Claude's socks!

11:12:13 PM    

Group B opened with Switzerland v Croatia. Five years ago, the newly independent Croatia was flying high and threatening to become a force in European football. But that was then, and this is now. Not even Switzerland going down to 10 men early in the second half could stir the Croatians from their comatose state. Indeed, more than once Switzerland spurned the chance to take the lead. England and France, preparing for their high profile encounter in Lisbon, will both be delighted that the game ended - as it deserved to - in a goalless draw. Neither will feel threatened by anything on display in this encounter. The BBC's live broadcast of this bore draw was followed by a lot of excitement when 75-year-old Bruce Forsyth came on to present Come Dancing. The fact that a 75-year-old man can produce more entertaining television than the combined talents of the Swiss and Croatian football teams really says it all.

8:08:24 PM    

The BBC's TV coverage of Euro 2004 reveals the unsatisfactory situation with TV picture formats in Europe. Studio output from the BBC's Portuguese studio base is being produced in 16 x 9 format, which I believe is the first time the BBC has done that from a temporary studio outside the UK, at least for football. However, Portuguese TV is covering the games in standard 4 x 3 format. Since the pictures are routed via the BBC's Lisbon studio, the whole transmission is sent as 16 x 9 with a space at each side while the live match coverage is in progress. My 4 x 3 TV set in the bedroom thinks it's a normal 16 x 9 picture, because that's what the encoding tells it, and displays a small 4 x 3 picture that doesn't fill the whole screen, but has black space on all four sides. 

The Dutch public broadcaster NOS has no such problems, and you get a 4 x 3 picture that fills the whole screen. I think the BBC has made a mistake in opting to go 16 x 9 for studio shots, when the live coverage and much of the material used in the preview programmes is still 4 x 3. I do have a widescreen set downstairs, where the picture size on NOS and BBC is the same, but not everyone does.

3:53:37 PM    

Inevitably, it seems, the first reports of bad behaviour in Portugal involve England fans. One is reported to have attacked a Portuguese marching band with pepper spray. Now comes word that UEFA President Lennart Johansson is backtracking on threats to kick England out of the tournament if their fans misbehave. Johansson says that earlier reports do not reflect official UEFA policy. The Football Association cannot be held responsible for the behaviour of its fans, he says, which is the exact opposite of what was being reported just a week ago.

Now, as an Englishman, I'd be devastated if the national team were to be thrown out of the competition. Especially this time, with several Chelsea players set to play a key role in the team. Neither do I think it was ever likely to happen. But by openly declaring as much on the eve of a huge game against France, Mr Johansson has effectively given the England supporters carte blanche (or whatever that is in Portuguese) to misbehave as much as they want. The sort of people who indulge in miscreant behaviour are generally not the brightest stars in the galaxy. Such a threat, empty or not, might just have helped to curb some of their excesses sufficiently for England to get through this tournament without widespread fan misbehaviour. But now that the threat has officially been removed, I bet the FA and the British police are seething with Johansson for failing to keep his mouth shut. He didn't need to go public at this stage. What is it with these football officials? They can't seem to stop scoring own goals.

1:25:46 PM    

The blimp that broughts us aerial pictures of the stadium in Porto where the hosts were beaten in the opening game by Greece fared as badly as the beaten Portuguese team. Soon after the game had ended, the blimp went down in the Atlantic Ocean. The two man-crew were rescued by firefighters, and were unhurt. The news report doesn't say whether the blimp was damaged or not. The incident capped a depressing evening for the host nation. Let's hope for their sake it's not an omen for what's to come.

1:08:22 PM