Football fans around the world must have cursing their TV sets Wednesday night when the TV transmission was interrupted three separate times during key moments in the thrilling Euro 2008 semi-final between Germany and Turkey.

UEFA is investigating the situation to find out what happened, but it appears that a thunderstorm is blamed for the interruptions. Neverthless, the damage has already been done. UEFA will have to do everything it can to prevent similar embarrassing incidents from happening in the future.

While the interruptions in transmission appeared to happen around the world, this is how the technical difficulties occurred while watching the game on ESPN in the United States:

• At minute 57:15, the screen went black. ESPN quickly changed the video to show live coverage of the Fan Zone in Basel where mostly German fans congregated. ESPN commentator Derek Rae handled the situation very calmly and professionally before handing the reins back to Rece Davis in the ESPN studio. Davis and pundits Julie Foudy and Tommy Smyth then proceeded to go through the motions and repeat everything they had said almost verbatim from the half-time show including showing the same video footage.
• After almost seven minutes without coverage, the live game feed on ESPN returned at minute 64:10.
• At minute 76:26, ESPN lost the live TV feed again. This was at a crucial moment in the game and it was unfortunate that viewers around the world missed Miroslav Klose’s goal for Germany in the 79th minute to make it 2-1. The bad fortune for ESPN (and broadcasters around the world) was compounded when the interruption in TV feeds missed Turkey’s equalizer in the 86th minute. When ESPN’s live feed returned, at minute 86:34, viewers saw the Turks celebrating Senturk’s goal.
• ESPN was lucky with the third and final goal for Germany when Philip Lahm scored in the 90th minute. At minute 90:32, ESPN lost the TV feed yet again but returned shortly afterwards to show that the game had just finished with scenes of the German players and fans celebrating.

Overall, ESPN was unable to show more than 17 minutes of live TV football coverage because of the technical problems suffered by UEFA. ESPN and broadcasters worldwide were terribly fortunate that the winning goal of the match was shown. If that one had gone in the net during the timespan when UEFA had lost the TV transmission, there would have been riots in the streets.

Please share your stories about what happened and how your TV network handled the technical difficulties by clicking the comments link below.

Fans of association football will have all experienced this at one time or another. When watching a match on TV, there’s a specific camera angle that’s diagonal to the goal where it looks like the ball is going near the net, only to find out that the ball goes up and is sent in the opposite direction away from goal.

I’ve watched more than a thousand matches on TV in my lifetime and I still find myself jumping up for joy at what looks like a clear shot or header on goal only to sheepishly turn away and hope that no one saw how silly I was. The ball actually heads up and slightly to the camera, not away from it.

It’s what I call the Bermuda Triangle of soccer TV camera angles where strange things happen. It’s so annoying and happens once or twice in every three to four matches I watch.

A perfect example of this phenomenon was in the 51st minute of the Croatia against Turkey game when Olic raced in to the box to head the ball past Turkish goalkeeper Rustu. The ball went up into the air and over the goalie’s head. It looked to be heading into the net only for it to go straight up and slightly away from goal.

Can anyone explain this phenomenon and why it happens?

First of all, let me say what a super performance Germany gave last night. They tactically outclassed Portugal from the get go and thoroughly deserved their win. Anyway, enough of yesterday, now for today’s big clash. Before yesterday, I’d have put my house on Croatia winning this game, now I’m not so sure I don’t have a niggle like yesterday but Turkey have shown you write them off at your peril. The Croats have played some excellent stuff in this tournament but Turkey have shown tremendous nous and spirit to come back from the dead in two straight games.

Realistically though, Croatia started slowly but have begun to improve game on game, their second string beating Poland 1-0 with a goal from Klasnic and I honestly think that Luka Modric has been one of the star players at this tournament so far. Turkey need to get a man marker on him and try to stifle his creativity. Having said that though, Germany put Frings on him and he danced around him like a statue. Turkey’s danger man is Turan; he loves to come from deep and attack the ball, playing off Nihat and Tuncay. Will Croatia go like for like or simply get the ball down and try and play their way through? Turkey have also lost first choice keeper Voltan after Jan Koller’s acrobatics, so Rustu Recber comes in for his for his record extending 117th cap tonight and the former Barcelona player will be keen to show he’s lost none of his abilities at 35 years of age.

Turkey have shown us all that they are a fast breaking team who play positive, possession football. Both sides have shown that they like to play good attacking football and play with pride for their nations. It is a lesson England would do well to try and emulate in future under Capello. The British press are complaining that this is the weakest of the 4 games but I’m disappointed to hear that type of criticism. Then again, the commentary in last night’s Portugal v Germany game was so biased toward Portugal as to be embarrassing, Ronaldo’s personal fan club defending his every action, slating every German challenge on him and then they didn’t bother interviewing any German players at the end which was really sad to see. Old habits die hard in British football coverage even in 2008.

Both sides fully deserve to be here and I think we’ll get a great game of football. Using my head, I’m going for a Croatian win, maybe 3-2 or 2-1, but if Turkey get a late goal, hold on tight because we’ll get a grandstand finish.

Tonight sees the first dual clash with Czech Republic playing Turkey whilst Switzerland host Portugal. With Portugal through as Group Winners, all eyes will be on Geneva. We could potentially have a first in Group qualification with the fact that should tonight’s game end in a draw, we will go straight into a penalty shoot out to decide who finishes runners up in the group. I hope we don’t come to that and the game is completely decided before the final whistle is blown.

It’s looking more and more likely that the Czechs will revert to playing Koller and Baros together up front. This tournament has really shown just how much quality they’ve lost from midfield with the retirements of Nedved, Berger, Smicer, Poborsky and the injury to Rosicky. They’ve played a game that is based on midfielders bursting forward to link up with the front man, but the quality simply hasn’t been there.

Turkey also may look to starting the game with the team that finished the 2-1 victory that eliminated the Swiss as coach Fatih Terim looks to guide the Turks through. He made a tactically brilliant change at half time to swing the game in their favour and Terim has often been underrated as a coach, the disappointing spell as coach of AC Milan perhaps diluting his achievements at Fiorentina and Galatasaray and his first stint as national coach. 

Turkey certainly looked back to their best in the second half against the Swiss and this game is make or break for both coaches. I’m going to go for a 1-0 win for the Czech Republic tonight, which will then lead them to a potential clash with Germany in the Quarter Finals.

Tonight’s other game will probably gives us a chance to see the players on the fringes of the Portuguese squad, with Queresma, Almeida and Nani expected to start. Switzerland will be playing for pride tonight but know that their opponents will have several players trying to prove to Phil Scolari that they deserve a chance of being in his first choice XI. Whilst it would be nice for the Swiss to get anything out of this, I can’t see them beating Portugal and think it could be a 3-0 defeat for the Swiss.   

I’ve finally had a chance to catch up on watching some of the Euro 2008 matches I missed. The jet lag hit me later in the week, so I found myself watching many of the games this week at weird hours on DVR.The one thing about football is that it can be so subjective. Earlier in the week, I found myself watching the 1-0 Croatia win against Austria game on the giant screen TV at the FanZone in Zurich. To me, Croatia looked like a very hard working team in the first half who were playing some wonderful football. Especially impressive was Ivica Olic, the Croat striker who plays for Hamburg, who was a workhouse throughout the game putting in an incredible performance. If ever there was a player who would do well in the Premier League, Olic is it.In their game against Austria, Croatia changed their tactics in the second half, which allowed Austria to press forward more. And it was the Austrians who impressed me, putting to bed all the fears about them being the worst team in the tournament.So I was surprised when I returned to the States and was hearing and reading the comments about Croatia looking weak in their first match. Against Germany, the Croats showed their true strength in their 2-1 win and it’s now Germany — many people’s favorites to win Euro 2008 — who risk getting knocked out of the tournament depending what happens in their final match against Austria.The other thing I found surprising when I returned to the States was the perception among many that this has been a boring tournament thus far. Sure, it’s easier to enjoy the atmosphere and games when you’re experiencing them in Switzerland, but still, the tournament to me has been one of the most exciting football events in quite some time, even more so than World Cup 2006. The France against Romania nil-nil match was horrible, but aside from that, I’ve enjoyed all of the other matches.Speaking of Romania, their 1-1 draw against Italy on Friday was a brilliant match to watch. So much goalmouth action with balls hitting the post or goalkeepers pulling off incredible saves. Buffon’s penalty save, too, was amazing to watch. Romania could have easily won the match in the first half, while Italy showed in this game their masterful technical touches — beautiful flicks, excellent ball control, deft passes and wonderful creativity — something which is desperately lacking in the Premier League and on the England national team.Italy, though, has to feel cheated by the goal that was ruled offside. On replay, it’s clear that the goal should have counted. But when I watched it in real-time, it looked to me to be offside, so I empathize why the referee and assistant referee thought the whistle should have been blown for offside.I’ve been writing about how impressed I’ve been about Holland since Monday and they completely blew me away again on Friday with their 4-1 win against France. In fairness, the French are to blame for this scoreline as they had plenty of chances to score. Just as in the match against Italy, the Dutch took full advantage of the chances they had with their clinical finishing.While Holland and Croatia continue to impress, Portugal can be added to that list. In their first game against Turkey, I thought the Portugese looked very entertaining with Pepe, especially, being a revelation. Portugal also looked breathtaking in the 3-1 win over Czech Republic. So far this tournament, the Czechs have done very little to impress me.For all of the bad press Austria got from the pundits and their own fans before the tournament started, I’ve been more impressed by the Austrians than Switzerland. Austria deserved to get the 1-1 draw against Poland earlier this week, and the penalty decision by Howard Webb, I believe, was a correct one.Speaking of Switzerland, the national team was dealt a cruel blow when Alex Frei was injured in their 0-1 loss to Czech Republic. But in the Swiss 2-1 loss to Turkey, it was Turkey’s Arda Turan who was the relevation. The Galatasaray winger scored two beautiful goals. The first, a beautifully taken header, and the second was an amazing shot in the last minute of the game, which will be one of the goals of the tournament.The one group I haven’t had a chance to watch so far this tournament is Group D because I was traveling throughout the day on Tuesday and missed Spain‘s demolition of Russia and the entertaining game between Sweden and Greece. I’m looking forward to seeing those matches on Saturday.

After one set of games, we now have the groups beginning to take shape and we move into the second phase of matches. Everyone who wins in this particular round knows that they still have a chance of qualifying or indeed making sure that they have qualified for the Quarter Finals.

The first of tonight’s matches sees the Czech Republic play Portugal, the winner definitely through to the next round. Looking at both sides first games, Portugal will be strong favourites to win tonight and if they play anywhere near as well as they did Saturday night, then they’ll over-run the Czechs. Yet the Czechs will also know that they were fairly fortunate against a very resolute Swiss team and will be looking to give a far better account to themselves than they did.

They looked quite poor up-front though and the strikers will need to offer a lot more for them to have any chance of taking anything from the game. I’m going for a 3-1 Portugal win in this match.

The second game features Switzerland v Turkey. Both teams need to win to have any chance of having a strong chance of qualification so we should see an open game. Switzerland were a lot better than I thought they would be in the first game but couldn’t finish. With Yakin coming in for the injured Frei, they’ll have clever player pushing them forward. Turkey looked shell shocked on Saturday, they never got into the game and were quiet flattered by a 2-0 score line.

I expected a lot more from them than they showed, which really surprised me. Whilst they’re not the strongest Turkish side of recent years, Portugal made them look very ordinary and they’ll be up for showing everyone a lot more. I think the home support will be crucial tonight and I’m going to plump for a 1-0 win to Switzerland.

Real Madrid defender Pepe scored his first goal for Portugal today in their game against Turkey. While the goal was impressive, the interplay between Pepe and captain Nuno Gomes was exceptional. There are few aspects of soccer that are a better example of teamwork than a well executed one-two. Watch this perfect example: