The Euro 2012 championships kicked off yesterday with the first two games out of a total of 31, the last being the final to be played in Kiev on 1 July.

For the first time, a top European competition is being hosted by two former Eastern European countries, Poland and Ukraine, and all of Europe’s eyes are on these two nations to see how they will cope with handling such an important event.

But, apart from the political aspects that unfortunately always find a way to intrude on sport activities, football enthusiasts should be in for great entertainment as the tournament unfolds.

Here in Malta, such events always expose the two-party system that seems to exist at all levels – whether it’s politics, village feasts, band clubs or football, we always end up entangled in the “us and them” mentality. Now it’s Italy versus England again, although over the years the number of people supporting Germany has grown as well.

Italy and England are not among the favourites to be crowned European champions. Italy are a far cry from having the squad that enabled them to lift the World Cup trophy in 2006, while England lost manager Capello and have recently also been deprived of a number of players who were ruled out through injury.

Both national teams seem to be, on paper, inferior to the likes of Germany, Holland and Spain, with the latter trying to become the first nation to win back-to-back European championships. It must not be forgotten that Spain are also the reigning world champions, although it appears that many of their players are now past their peak.

Unlike the World Cup, however, where it is always the favourite teams which make it to the final, history has shown us that this competition is more open to surprises.

It happened in 1992, when Denmark went on to be crowned European champions after they replaced Yugoslavia – at that time kicked out of the competition because states forming the nation were at war with each other. And it happened again in 2004, when Greece emerged as the surprise winners.

Will it happen again this time? Hard to tell.