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How The F365 Euro Prophets Fared...

At the start of Euro 2008, the finest minds F365 has to offer (and Pete Gill) put their professional reputations on the line and predicted how we thought the tournament would unfold.

None of us expected it would be quite as good as it was, but let's have a look at just how murky our crystal balls really are.

First, the most important question of who would win the thing. Glory, glory goes to Nick Miller, who plumped for the Spanish, although his reasoning stank of a man trying to cover himself should it all go wrong:

'Some clown always picks Spain, so I will be that clown. Logically they should be up there - they have the best keeper, the most creative midfield and one of the best centre-forwards. Then again, logic and Spain have never been close friends.'

Frankly, the man needed a result in this set of predictions, after famously declaring that Fernando Torres would be 'this season's Shevchenko' at the start of the last domestic campaign.

Still, he was bob on, which is more than can be said for mystics Gill and Adam Fraser, who were adamant that France would go all the way. They have both been sent to the corner with a dunce's hat and The Big Book of European Football, and told to only come back once they've learned a thing or two. Troublingly, and as regular readers will be aware, Mr Fraser is our man in France, which suggests that he's been spending too much time on the beach, eating garlic and surrendering to passing German tourists.

Sarah Winterburn, John Nicholson and Philip Cornwall all emerge with some degree of credit having picked out Germany, although Tim Stannard might want to reconsider any fortune-telling plans after tipping Italy.

Fraser redeemed himself somewhat by picking out Turkey as the 'Greece' of 2008, as did Miller, who is rumoured to be jacking in the journalism lark in favour of a career as a carnival clairvoyant, travelling the land and duping old dears out of their life savings.

However, he'll be crawling back if he makes any more predictions like claiming Italy would go out at the group stage. Glory for that one goes to prophets Winterburn and Stannard, who went for France to flop, and Fraser, who correctly foretold the demise of the Czech Republic.

All seven scribes shamefully dodged the question of whether Cristiano Ronaldo would star or bottle it, all hedging their bets by predicting somewhere between the two, which turned out to be pretty much spot on.

Nobody picked out David Villa for top scorer, with Winterburn and Nicholson coming closest by claiming Lukas Podolski would be top onion-bag rippler. Podolski, of course, ended up with three strikes to his name.

It's difficult to assess the question of which player would be purchased on the back of a good tournament, but we should bring attention to Gill asking whether it would be 'cheating to say Samir Nasri'. Yes Pete, it would.

Credit all round on the subject of who will play cracking football but come up short, with Croatia, Holland and Portugal all correctly backed, although in a tournament this good you could probably say anyone but France or the two hosts and not be totally disgraced.

As for a big name failing to to the business, Winterburn and Stannard won't be pleased with their forecast that Fernando Torres would slip up, and nor will Gill after claiming Cesc Fabregas wouldn't measure up. A bag of sweets and pats on the head go to Miller, Nicholson and Cornwall, who all predicted Thierry Henry to go down badly.

However, in terms of who would star, Fraser gets a bag of poo and a smack in the chops for his assertation that the Barca pouter would have the tournament licked.

'If I'd said Thierry Henry two years ago I'd have been called boring' droned our man in Gaulle. 'Now people will laugh. But Thierry Henry.' Trust us Adam, we're p***ing ourselves.

Nobody picked out official UEFA top-dog Xavi Hernandez, and certainly nobody chose Marcos Senna, the man who really was the best, but credit goes to Winterburn, Gill (at last), Cornwall and Nicholson for picking out the intimidatingly-endowed Michael Ballack as cock of the continent.

In summary, the general response to our prophecies should be 'Don't give up the day job'. Unfortunately, for most of us that would mean the dole queue, sleeping in a ditch and eating from bins, so we'll stick around for now.

To inspect our predictions in full, or just to have a good chuckle, click here.