His eyes were red and puffy. He winced, stretching his lip over his teeth in a Bogart-esque manner, then blinked upwards, fighting back tears in front of the world. A young Cristiano Ronaldo, a teenager then, had just been denied victory on home soil in the final of Football Euro 2004, a tournament he felt destined to win. Even a decade later, the raw emotion of watching Cristiano Ronaldo cry after that defeat still resonates powerfully.
Euro 2004 marked not only Ronaldo’s debut on the major international stage but also the beginning of a footballing education for many fans worldwide. For those new to the beautiful game, the tournament delivered a harsh but crucial lesson, one that Ronaldo himself learned in a painful 90 minutes: football can be incredibly cruel. Unlike American sports, often structured for parity, European football, particularly at the international level, often feels like a rigid hierarchy. The established powers, the footballing nobility, are expected to win, leaving scraps for the lesser nations. Yet, football euro 2004 spectacularly defied this norm.
The Unthinkable Rise of Greece at Football Euro 2004
The Greek national team arrived in Portugal for football euro 2004 as mere afterthoughts. Their history in major tournaments was bleak; they had never won a single game in a major competition. Widely considered the weakest team in the tournament, they were essentially presented as sacrificial lambs for the opening match against the host nation, Portugal. It was supposed to be a straightforward victory for Ronaldo and the established Portuguese stars to kick off their campaign on a high note. Many, expecting a predictable Portuguese rout, almost missed witnessing the start of footballing history. However, Greece, against all predictions, battled their way to a stunning 2-1 victory. This opening game itself served as the first major lesson of football euro 2004: in this tournament, and in football in general, expect the unexpected and never look away, even for a moment. Remarkably, those two goals in the opening match would turn out to be the most Greece would score in any single game throughout the entire tournament. For the rest of their improbable journey, a single goal would always prove sufficient.
Throughout football euro 2004 in Portugal, Greece found themselves facing a gauntlet of footballing giants, the celebrated stars who had dominated the previous decade. From the ‘Galácticos’ like Luís Figo, Zinedine Zidane, and Raúl, to European icons such as Pavel Nedvěd, the Greeks were consistently outmatched on paper. Confronted with a seemingly insurmountable gap in individual talent, Greece’s wily German manager, Otto Rehhagel, opted for a pragmatic, some might say, disruptive approach: break the game. His tactical blueprint was built on a rock-solid, impenetrable defense. The Greek players would relentlessly clog the goalmouth, marking opposing players with such intensity and discipline that even the most gifted playmakers found themselves suffocated, unable to conjure their usual magic. By dragging the most celebrated teams in Europe down into a physical and tactical quagmire, Greece transformed the beautiful game into a brutal battle of attrition, and then, with surprising efficiency, they picked their opponents apart.
While similar defensive tactics employed by a modern, expensively assembled club like a $200 million Chelsea might be criticized for being aesthetically unappealing and “unwatchable,” there was a different context to Greece’s approach. Greece simply did not possess the individual brilliance to dominate games through attacking flair. Their defensive strategy wasn’t about cynical negativity; it was a necessity, a way to level the playing field. Crucially, despite their rigid defensive structure, Greece weren’t entirely impenetrable. In almost every match, opposing teams would come agonizingly close to breaching their defenses. Shots would narrowly miss the target, or be directed straight into the grateful arms of the Greek goalkeeper – moments of near equalizers that didn’t materialize due to a combination of factors: perhaps fate, luck, or, as some more critical observers might suggest, simply offensive shortcomings from their opponents. More traditional football fans often labeled these Greek matches as “boring,” prioritizing attacking spectacle over defensive resilience. However, many, including those witnessing the football euro 2004 fairytale unfold, recognized the beauty in Greece’s unwavering commitment to their strategy. For them, winning ugly was infinitely preferable to losing beautifully. Guerrilla tactics had historically served the Greeks well in warfare – why should the football pitch be any different? Their motto seemed to be: Kill the space, stifle the creativity, scorch the earth, and remember the spirit of Thermopylae, where a small force valiantly held off a vastly superior enemy.
Upsetting Giants on the Road to the Final
After narrowly navigating their way through the group stages, against all odds, Greece found themselves facing the reigning European Champions, France, in the quarter-finals of football euro 2004. France, a team brimming with world-class talent, boasted not just the legendary Zinedine Zidane, but also Thierry Henry, Patrick Vieira, and Robert Pirès, who had just completed an unprecedented undefeated season with Arsenal in the English Premier League. Conventional wisdom dictated that Greece’s improbable run was about to end, that they were now destined for the footballing abattoir against such formidable opposition. Yet, the match remained stubbornly goalless for over an hour. Then, in a moment that epitomized the tournament’s unpredictable nature, Theodoros Zagorakis, the Greek captain, produced a flash of uncharacteristic flair. In a move more reminiscent of Zidane himself, Zagorakis flicked the ball audaciously over the head of a French defender, surged past him, and delivered a perfect cross into the box. Angelos Charisteas rose to meet it, heading home the decisive goal.
It was the kind of moment of brilliance one expected from Zidane, but on this occasion, it was a Greek player who delivered it. In the same year Zidane was voted the best European player of the last half-century (1954-2004), the disciplined Greek midfield effectively neutralized him, rendering him largely ineffective throughout the match. For both club and country, Zidane, despite his legendary status, would never lift another major trophy after this defeat at football euro 2004.
The semi-finals of football euro 2004 pitted Greece against another tournament favorite, the Czech Republic. The Czechs had their own compelling narrative, having dramatically qualified for the semi-finals with a stunning three-goal comeback victory against the Netherlands in the previous round. However, they too found themselves unable to unlock the suffocating Greek defense. A critical blow to the Czech hopes came when their talismanic midfielder, Pavel Nedvěd, was forced off with an injury in the first half. With Nedvěd’s creativity and drive absent, the Czech attacking verve noticeably diminished.
As the match stretched into extra time, exhaustion became palpable, with players from both sides succumbing to cramps. Despite the fatigue, the score remained locked at 0-0. The Czechs, boasting the prodigious young goalkeeper Petr Čech, might have felt confident about their chances in a penalty shootout. However, they wouldn’t even get that far. Moments before the end of the first period of extra time, a lapse in concentration while defending a corner proved fatal. Traianos Dellas rose unchallenged to head the ball past a stranded Čech. It was a silver goal, a now-abolished rule where a goal scored in extra time immediately ended the game. The Greeks, incredibly, were through to the final of football euro 2004.
The Final and the Tears of Ronaldo
While the world, perhaps with the notable exception of Greece itself, remained largely bewildered and somewhat unimpressed by Greece’s style of play, ten years later, as fans celebrate more conventionally exciting international tournaments, football euro 2004 is often remembered with a degree of disdain, a nadir in major tournament football. Many fans tune into international tournaments seeking an escape from the often-grinding nature of club football. They crave brilliance, wanting to invest emotionally in teams like France, Brazil, or the Netherlands, nations traditionally associated with the beautiful game, teams expected to deliver captivating attacking football and thrilling narratives. Football euro 2004’s Greece, with their pragmatic, defense-first approach, were seen as spoilers, crashing the party and disrupting the expected spectacle.
In the final in Lisbon, fate offered Portugal a chance for revenge against the team that had inflicted that humiliating defeat in the tournament opener. Portugal, driven by the desire to win a major trophy on home soil, was spearheaded by not only the young Ronaldo but also the experienced veterans of their ‘golden generation,’ players like Rui Costa and Luís Figo. These players, victors in the 1989 Youth World Championship, had carried the weight of expectation for fifteen years, constantly falling short of fulfilling their immense potential. Football euro 2004 represented their last realistic opportunity to achieve major international success.
However, the Greeks, whom The Guardian famously labeled “the only underdogs in history that everyone wants to see get beaten,” continued to defy expectations and ride their wave of improbable fortune. Early in the second half of the final, from their only corner of the entire match, and remarkably, their only shot on target, Greece scored. Once again, it was Angelos Charisteas, heading home the decisive goal. Despite sustained pressure and near misses from Ronaldo, Figo, and Rui Costa, the resolute Greek defense held firm. They weathered the storm, clung on desperately, and against all logic, won football euro 2004. And as the final whistle blew, Cristiano Ronaldo, the young star who had been expected to lead Portugal to glory, was left in tears, his youthful dreams shattered by the Greek wall.
While the image of a weeping Ronaldo in 2004 initially evoked a sense of schadenfreude in some, a decade later, perspectives have shifted. The “entitled astonishment” that once seemed to accompany Ronaldo’s disappointment now reads differently. Though still on the cusp of true greatness in 2004, Ronaldo was undeniably on his way to becoming a footballing icon. With age and experience, the inclination to automatically root for the underdog has diminished. Witnessing enough sporting upsets reveals a common thread: often, it’s not so much about the underdog playing exceptionally well, but rather a good team faltering under pressure. And while upsets can be momentarily thrilling, prolonged exposure to mediocrity breeds a hunger for genuine excellence. Beyond narratives and underdog stories, the purest sporting desire is often simply to witness the best perform at their best.
Back in 2004, watching football euro 2004 was a significant investment. Pay-Per-View access cost around $200, a considerable sum, especially as ESPN’s interest in the tournament was still nascent. At times, it felt like football euro 2004 was being broadcast solely for a niche audience of dedicated fans. Having become a passionate football supporter just a year prior, the allure was irresistible. The chance to watch Zidane and Nedvěd, Figo and Totti, Oliver Kahn and Fabien Barthez – these were the giants of the game. When I became a fan, they were already established legends, their reputations built on exploits I had only read about. Every year brings a new wave of talented players, but they are invariably younger, more relatable, less mythical. No footballer since has quite possessed the aura, the sheer magnitude, of Zidane in 2004.
Most of these footballing titans would feature again in the 2006 World Cup, but for many, it felt like a sad final act, a fading echo of past glories. Football euro 2004 had, in a sense, broken their spell. Cristiano Ronaldo learned a harsh but essential lesson about the unpredictable nature of sport, and so did many viewers. The tournament in Portugal began with the promise of watching titans clash, but it ended with an unexpected and enduring admiration for eleven hardy Greeks – the team that, against all odds, made the gods of football weep.
