HUDDLE ROUND...
It was a moment that summed up the crushing expectation of international tournament football.
Brazil and Chile were locked at two apiece in their penalty shootout at the 2014 World Cup, with a quarter-final place at stake. Up stepped Neymar, team talisman and tournament poster boy, to take the decisive spot-kick. Even those watching it all unfold on TV could feel the pressure radiating through the screen. What it must have been like to contend with the enormity of that moment, then, is almost unimaginable.
This is when sport, and particularly football, is just plain weird. In what other walk of life do we ask teenagers and twentysomethings to bear the burden of national expectation? That’s a job for politicians, not players. And yet it happens every couple of years and we treat it like it’s no big deal. Clearly, though, it is.
Next up to shoulder this load is Paul Pogba at Euro 2016. Like Neymar, he is the hosts’ star player and, as a result, the tournament’s poster boy. If that wasn’t enough, on each of the previous two occasions France won a major tournament on home soil they were carried to victory by an attacking midfielder who happened to play for Juventus: Michel Platini at Euro 84 and Zinedine Zidane at France 98. As if there wasn’t enough pressure already, Pogba has to live up to hype and history. Will he rise to the occasion or be crushed by it all? Turn to p36 to find out.
One last thing to add before Euro 2016 kicks off: good luck to England, Wales, Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland. We don’t know what is going to happen, but we’re certain it will be memorable.