Famous Ukrainian journalist Mykola Nesenyuk dedicated a post on Facebook to Euro 2024, which is being held in Germany for the second time.
This year, the final tournament of the European Football Championship is being held on German football fields for the second time. The first time it happened 36 years ago in what was then West Germany. At that time, East Germany was occupied by the Soviet Union, where several hundred thousand Soviet troops were based.
As it turned out, Euro 88 was the last European final where the USSR team played. At the time, it consisted almost entirely of Ukrainians-Baltacha, Kuznetsov, Ratz, Belanov, Bezsonov, Demyanenko, Protasov, Lytovchenko, Mykhailychenko, Zavarov... Of course, we all cheered for them. It was perhaps the strongest team in the history of our former homeland, which lost only in the final. But that's not what I want to remember today, but the fact that the football final of that time was like being on another planet for us.
Watching on TV the stadium stands in Munich, which were completely orange from the Dutch team's shirts (it was then that the fashion of going to football matches in the uniform of their team began among fans), we did not even dream that we would be able to go to football matches abroad like other Europeans. Why didn't we think of it? We didn't ask such questions back then. Now thousands of Ukrainian fans could freely travel to Germany for Euro 2024. But they can't because of the war. The eastern part of Ukraine, like the eastern part of Germany, is occupied by the enemy. We will have to wait and hope that Ukraine will play in the next European final in Germany again!
And not just play, but claim victory, just like in 1988. I want to believe that then nothing will prevent our fans from going there. Unfortunately, we cannot know what exactly they will remember about Euro 2024 then...
Mykola NESENYUK