Renaissance Men

Calm Italy Crowned European Champions After Breaking English Hearts In Shootout

- Rory Smith

London: All day, there had been noise. The songs had started early in the morning, as the first few hundred fans appeared on Wembley Way, flags fluttering from their backs. The songs started as soon as the train doors opened at the Wembley Park underground station, the renditions of “Three Lions” and “Sweet Caroline.”

Inside the stadium, the noise rang around, gathering force when it seemed England was experiencing some sort of lucid reverie: when Luke Shaw scored and the hosts led the European Championship final inside two minutes and everything was, after more than half a century, coming home. There was noise as Italy scrapped and clawed their way back, taming England’s abandon and wresting control of the ball, Leonardo Bonucci’s equalizer puncturing the national trance.