Diary / Jonathan Wilson / 18 June 2008 / Leave a comment

Our man in the Bern pit cautions that, while the Dutch have maintained momentum, only one nation have managed to win every game since 1980. And look what happened to them last night...

After all the hype, the spectacle seemed in the end rather tawdry, a big, dumb, once-proud beast, sluggish and slow-moving, shrivelling in the gaze of the spectators ringed around it. But enough of Romania's anti-climactic defeat to Holland last night; yesterday I also visited Bern's famous bear-pit.

The bear is the symbol of Bern, and the image appears throughout the town - on street signs, on the fountains, on the great clock that so inspired Einstein - yet if the bear itself is representative of the city, it is a dishevelled, miserable creature these days. This, said the sign by the side of the circular concrete depression in which it lives, was Pepe. Urs, said a smaller notice next to it, had been "euthenatized" in March 2007.

Pepe sat listlessly in the rain, half-heartedly pushing his front paws together in a gesture of supplication, begging visitors to throw down food. Slices of apple and orange could be bought, and as he snapped them out of the air, they did seem to give him some pleasure. But the pit is barely policed, and people also threw down a hunk of pizza - Pepe ate the cheese and tomato but left the base; a cereal bar - rejected entirely; and some fruit Mentoes - he tried one, chewed with evident distaste, and then ignored the rest. Only when he flashed out a great paw at a sparrow that landed too close was there any sense of the power and majesty he might once have had. It was all rather sad:
there are many medieval entertainments that seem rather cruel now, and this is one of them.

Romania were just as disappointing. As soon as news came through that Italy had taken the lead against France - meaning that, unless France, by then down to ten men, equalised, they had to win - heads seemed to drop. They were always going to be a team capable of defensive resolution, largely reliant on dead-balls and counter-attacks for their attacking options, but the situation was exacerbated by the absence through injury of their own real centre-forward, Ciprian Marica. Daniel Nicolae had toiled manfully in the previous two games, and Marius Nicolae (no relation) worked hard last night, but there is a reason why he plays for Inverness Caledonian Thistle.

You only hope that Adrian Mutu's frequent and obviously expressed despair at his team-mates' inadequacies doesn't undermine team spirit before their World Cup qualifying campaign. They are [3.6] to win a group that also includes France, Lithuania, Austria, Serbia and the Faroe Islands.

All the talk in the mixed zone afterwards was of the importance of the Dutch maintaining "momentum", but the worry for the tournament favourites [4.6] must be that no side ever wins six games in a row at a major championship. In fact, since the tournament went to an eight-team format in 1980, only France in 1984 have ever won every game, and even they needed extra-time to see off Portugal in the semi-final.

Not that such doubts affected the Dutch fans in the city centre last night. Bern is a city with a population of only 120,000, and it is estimated that on match days the Swiss have been outnumbered by the Dutch. "BERN IS THE CAPITAL OF HOLLAND", as the local newspaper put it. "Has anybody rung home?" asked Marco van Basten sardonically.
"Maybe we should check everything's OK. It's dangerous so many people are away."

Walking to the stadium yesterday, I took the road that passes up the hill east of the great loop of the rival that encircles the old town. The sight looking back to the Kornhausbrucke was astonishing - a long orange stream pouring across the bridge, like ants in a line having got wind of a particularly enticing heap of sugar.

None of the fans I spoke to thought Holland should have thrown the game to put Italy and France out. "We beat Italy once already," said Jan, a mechanic from Groningen who was wearing a pair of bright orange overalls. "We just do it again. It's easy." And the fact that so few sides have won every game? "So, we win one on penalties. Or we make history. It's OK."

Tags: Bern, Euro 2008 Betting, France, Italy, Netherlands, Romania