France favored to repeat European Cup title

The European Cup finished weeding out the small fry this past weekend with few surprises.

Thirty soccer powerhouses, like the Faroe Islands (one point), San Marino, Malta and Luxembourg (all zeros) went back to their farms, leaving the major leaguers, like France, Spain, Italy, and England to prepare for the final in Portugal, 2004.

The defending champions, France, came away looking the favorites again this year, being the only team with a perfect 8 win, 0 loss, 0 ties, plus an astounding 29 goals for and two goals against difference.

The only other team to come close was the surprise of the tournament, Czech Republic, who ousted the star laden Dutch team into second spot in their group.

The English team edged past fired up Turkey in a controversial game marked by the Turkish authorities decision not to allow any English (or non Turkish) supporters into the stadium in Istanbul for security reasons.

The game showed the worst that soccer can be -- politics, threats of hooliganism, and 90 minutes of boredom.

Even a penalty shot by English posterboy David Beckham went wild and couldn't move the 0-0 result.

The team to watch for underdog lovers is the Czech Republic.

Coming out of an emotion triumph over the traditional powerhouse Oranje of the Netherlands, the Czech team came into the final game against Austria exhausted.

It showed and they were soon behind in the score, and for the last 30 minutes, played one man less for a red card.

The red card was the kick in the butt they needed and they stormed back with two goals to win and show Europe that they may be small, but they will not be a push over for the big teams in Portugal.