Singing in the rain: Switzerland's national soccer team made a disappointingly early exit from their first European Championship on home soil, but organisers insist that Euro 2008 still brought major gains for the country as a whole.

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Singing in the rain: Switzerland's national soccer team made a disappointingly early exit from their first European Championship on home soil, but organisers insist that Euro 2008 still brought major gains for the country as a whole.

Euro 2008 was a stunning sporting success, a cash-cow, a financial disaster, a bit of a damp squib, exciting, disappointing, lasting too long and over too quickly. With more than two million visitors crowding into the Swiss stadiums and fanzones and just as many locals to keep happy, it is perhaps unsurprising that reactions to the tournament varied hugely.

Stripping away all the hype, it is good to remember that the event was first and foremost a football tournament and there were few, if any, negative opinions when ...

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