tschüss, Deutschland!
an idiot’s experience of photographing uefa euro 2024
When I began my photography journey in March of 2017, I never would have imagined that just over seven years later I would be covering the men’s UEFA European Championship final in a foreign country. From that first game in Stockport to a warm summer’s night a few miles east of Spandau, it’s been one hell of an adventure.
To mark the completion of my first major men’s international tournament, I spent the course of my time in Germany making notes with the plan to eventually put it into some form of content upon my return to the UK. So consider this article that piece of content.
An idiot’s guide to covering an international competition featuring some photos I took on my phone through the trip. Feel free to click on the images to expand them.
12 June 2024
After months of planning and organising spreadsheets (those who know me even remotely well will appreciate my love of Google Sheets), I was all packed to travel to Germany. A day removed from the fifth anniversary of meeting my other half; my present to her was to disappear for a month. Safe to say, she’s very forgiving!
I left home just prior to midday on the 12th, set for Manchester Piccadilly from our local metro stop back home, Stretford. From Piccadilly, a nerve-wracking two-hour train journey lay ahead of me - I had a reasonably tight connection swapping stations at London Euston to change onto the Eurostar to Brussels Zuid/Midi from London St Pancras International.
It was at St Pancras where the first bit of bad luck of my tournament reared its head. UEFA had introduced a new ‘seat-selection tool’ at the club finals in the weeks leading up to the Euros, but the tournament was to be its first real test. The issue for me, however, wasn’t related to the system itself but instead the timeslot I’d been given to pick my seat for the opening match which opened at 15:00 for my group that day. My Eurostar train departed London at 14:55 and immediately went underground, ruining any hopes of an internet connection to access the system. Forty-five minutes later I was finally online and was able to select a position in front of what I thought was to be the Scotland supporters.
Upon arrival in Belgium, my train connection with Eurostar to Cologne wouldn't leave for another hour and a half which wasn’t ideal. I didn’t particularly feel safe in the station so made use of the Interrail pass that I had purchased for the tournament for the first time to jump onto a Deutsche Bahn train departing an hour earlier. The ominous warning over the PA system, first in French, then German, then finally English about how Brussels is rife with train-based thefts didn’t fill me with confidence. Two hours on, I was in Cologne and once I navigated over the Hohenzollern Bridge, I could finally get some rest and check-in to the first of many hotels I’d be staying in over the course of the next month and a half.
13 June 2024
Day two began much like the first: at a railway station, this time in Cologne. The plan for today was to continue the journey toward Munich—the city hosting the opening match. However, this leg of the trip would only take me as far as Nuremberg.
Boarding the first-class carriage, I found it challenging to store my luggage amid a sea of tartan suitcases in the overhead racks. The carriage was filled with slightly rowdy Scotland supporters making the same journey which didn’t provide the peace and quiet I had hoped for when I set off that morning.
After what felt like an eternity, I arrived in Nuremberg, one of my favourite cities. It’s a charming place, offering a peaceful retreat from the hustle and bustle of Munich while still retaining the quintessential Bavarian charm of its larger counterpart.
14 June 2024
Matchday One. Germany v Scotland. Munich.
Friday the 14th had arrived, and to be honest, it was an emotional day.
As mentioned in the introduction, I never anticipated finding myself in this position, especially so soon after my first game on a basic camera at Edgeley Park. Being trusted by Danehouse (my employer, for those unaware) to cover this tournament solo was a lot to process. The responsibility felt overwhelming, particularly because I tend to put a lot of pressure on myself. The thought of managing an entire tournament in a foreign country alone was daunting.
After a morning filled with worry, I headed to the stadium to collect my accreditation earlier than planned, having heard about potential issues with the process. Fortunately, I secured my accreditation without any problems before making my way to Munich city centre to check into my next hotel.
The Munich stadium is a familiar venue for me, and I’m usually comfortable working there during regular Bayern Munich fixtures. However, for the opening match of this tournament, there were 160 photographers pitchside, making it challenging to navigate the narrow track at the Allianz Arena. I was assigned a spot on the side in front of the German supporters. While not my preferred location, it was manageable, and it could have been worse. I anticipated struggling to capture the pictures I wanted from this angle.
As for the match itself, Scotland had a tough time, facing a typically dominant host nation steeped in history of past international success. The Scots struggled, and though we didn’t expect them to be a strong challenge, it was still a disappointing performance from their side. From a photographic standpoint, the game was a promising start to the month. Niclas Füllkrug and Emre Can scored in the second half and ran right past me, allowing me to capture some goal celebrations early on.
15 June 2024
Match 2. Spain v Croatia. Berlin.
After getting back to my hotel at a lovely 3AM following the Germany v Scotland game, I had a few hours of sleep before I had to be at Munich Hauptbahnhof for my next train journey. Berlin was the destination and, following my earlier profession of love for Nuremberg, I must preface this day’s entry by explaining that Berlin is comfortably my favourite city on Earth so I was excited to get back to the German capital for my second match of the tournament.
Four hours after boarding, I was finally in Berlin. My hotel was just across the road from the major Berlin station, Berlin Hauptbahnhof, which gave me some time to check-in and drop-off my clothes (currently being kept in an Aldi bag-for-life) in the room to make the bag checks at the stadium a bit easier.
It wasn’t until I arrived at the Olympiastadion that I realised that as well as leaving all of my clothes in the hotel as intended; I had also left the tournament photographer bib that UEFA had provided me with the day prior in the room too. This predictably led to a very panicked rush through security at the stadium before running to the media centre to try and get a second bib just for this one game, that I could return after full-time. I had no expectation that I would receive one and instead presumed I would be turned away from just the second game of the tournament. Fortunately, the UEFA staff were very understanding and I was provided with a temporary bib for the day.
The match itself was a blossom of colour compared to the game in Munich. A scorching day with both sets of supporters adorning their traditional shades of red. Three first-half goals for the Spaniards settled the game early and I was fortunate enough to get a couple of goal celebrations in my corner. Little did I know that those would be the last I would see in my direction for almost two weeks!
After the full-time whistle, I was able to take a step back and consider the history of the stadium that I had just shot a match in. The Olympiastadion was the host venue of one of the most notable Olympic moments of all-time, it had also played host to the infamous Zidane headbutt on Materazzi, and there I was processing the fact that I had been able to photograph a match there.
Proper bucket list stuff.
16 June 2024
Match Three. England v Serbia. Gelsenkirchen.
Another early start in Berlin followed with a lengthy journey to Gelsenkirchen for the first of England’s group matches. Gelsenkirchen is a comparatively small city when placed alongside some of the other host venues with population similar to that of Wolverhampton and, as I found out pretty quickly, seemed to be incapable of hosting a major football tournament.
The first issue to be found with Gelsenkirchen is that it isn’t on any of the main German train lines, despite being surrounded by other similar sized cities that were. This meant that my journey from Berlin involved a stop at Essen before switching trains to a regional service which took about fifteen minutes to get into Gelsenkirchen Hauptbahnhof. I quickly nipped out of the station to check-in to my hotel, approximately a five minute walk from the central station. I made sure not to leave my bib in the room this time.
Upon my return to the station, I spent a good ten minutes trying to work out how to get the tram to the stadium. The journey from the city centre to the Arena AufSchalke should take about fifteen minutes apparently however due to the absolutely tiny trams and the infrequency of their service (I was told they were every half hour), it took about ten minutes just to squeeze on, and then another thirty minutes to get to the stadium. That said, I had better luck than most supporters trying to get to the Arena who ended up walking the six kilometres from the centre after being left stranded by the lack of service of the trams.
I arrived at the stadium with plenty of time to spare though - a solid five hours before kick-off - which was quite handy as the queue just to get through the media entrance took an hour or so. To be completely fair, the Arena in Gelsenkirchen (home of FC Schalke 04) is a lovely stadium to work at once you get there. It’s got four very steep stands as well as a roof and a large box of LED screens above the centre-circle, akin to the sort you would see in an American basketball or ice hockey arena.
The game itself was pretty awful photographically. England scored early through Bellingham down the other end of the pitch and not a whole lot happened from then on. Forgive me for glossing over the match entirely; the game quickly slipped my mind with the transport chaos that was still to come.
The same service that had caused massive issues for fans getting to the stadium then caused issues for the same set of fans getting away from the stadium. One or two Manchester Metrolink-esque trams every half hour to transport fifty thousand football supporters into the city centre. I left the media centre at 01:00, a whole two hours after full-time, and the queue for the trams hadn’t really dissipated at all. I joined the queue and stood in place for what must have been another hour and a half before finally being funnelled down onto a platform to board.
It was 03:58 when I finally got to my hotel room. I had no intention of rushing back to Gelsenkirchen for any future matches.
17 June 2024
No Match.
The next morning I was due to make the relatively short journey into Belgium for the first of two off-days due to accreditation rejections for matches I had originally planned for in the schedule. I sat in the hotel as long as I was permitted, which gave me plenty of time to peruse the list of things to do in Liege. Safe to say, the reviews of Liege weren’t filling me with confidence that I’d be particularly safe and so I instead tried to find other cities I could base myself in until my next match. For some reason, the city of Koblenz stuck out to me. It wasn’t too far from Cologne, had decent transport connections and it just looked like a lovely place to settle down after a pretty intense few days of travel across the country.
I hastily booked an apartment for that afternoon and cancelled my hotel booking in Liege before making the short journey from Gelsenkirchen to Koblenz with a change in Duisburg. (Note: don’t go to Duisburg).
Upon arrival in Koblenz, I was able to make use of a local Aldi Süd (there are two Aldi chains in Germany, Süd is the Aldi Brits will be familiar with) to pick up some stuff for tea before making the short walk to my impossible-to-find apartment. Once I had finally managed to access the room, I found it to have been left uncleaned from previous occupants. Bemused, I dropped the hosts an email only to be startled by a knock at the door.
It was a cleaner who seemed surprised to see me, which is pretty fair given I had only booked the room three hours prior. I quickly tried to apologise for being too early, originally in English, then through Google Translate in German, only to discover that neither of us could speak German. He couldn’t speak English, so we ended up having an odd back-and-forth trying to work out which language we both spoke before managing to organise an English-to-Polish Google Translate conversation. About an hour later, my Polish friend left and I was finally able to start catching up on my second edit of the previous night’s match.
18 June 2024
No Match
Another day off gave me the chance to explore a touch. Koblenz is a city on the Rhine so I was hopeful of being able to see the local sights. This plan was scuppered slightly by the amber warning of Thunderstorms due in the early afternoon. I eventually pencilled in a ten minute train journey to see a castle overlooking the Rhine just south of the city. I made my way to the nearest station to the best vantage point and snapped some touristy photos of the impressive Schloss Stolzenfels, a thirteenth-century castle that was rebuilt in the 1800s after falling into disrepair. Admittedly, I didn’t get a huge amount of time to enjoy being a tourist as the flashes of lightning and rumbles of thunder in the distance suddenly felt significantly closer.
Generally, there are some pretty decent pieces of advice to avoid being struck by lightning - avoid trees, avoid elevation, avoid open spaces and avoid standing near water - and here I was on a pebble beach stood along one of the largest rivers in Europe, with my only real route of escape from the peril being to walk up a hill to the train station that involved a wooded area. Not my brightest moment.
However, I’m currently typing out this blog post so I’ve obviously made it out alive, ha!
19 June 2024
Match 4. Scotland v Switzerland. Cologne.
After a few days off it was time to get back to work with a trip back to Cologne for Scotland’s second game of the tournament. Koblenz to Cologne is a fairly short journey and so it didn’t take long before I was in the bustling square overlooked by the impressive Cologne Cathedral. As expected, the areas around Hauptbahnhof were hectic as the Scots had taken over most of the city centre. I made a quick dash to my hotel to check-in. This hotel was the first of what was to be many where there was no lift and I was placed on the very top floor, which I can assure you isn’t that enjoyable with all of my camera equipment and personal artefacts. Upon departure, the hotel requested their key back and I’d have to ask for it back when I returned which I thought was strange.
Moving on, I made the short walk to the nearest metro stop on my way to the stadium. This gave me my first glimpse of a surprising chain of doner kebab restaurants fronted by former Germany international Lukas Podolski too. The events in Gelsenkirchen made me feel as though I now needed to arrive at stadiums even earlier than I had been previously. For this game, my aim was to be outside stadium security five and a half hours before KO, something I can’t say I enjoy and something that definitely made me question the sanity of all of those photographers who get to Wembley five hours early for cup finals (for non-photographers, you probably have no clue what I’m talking about).
In England, drinking in the stands is outlawed and I believe this is rightly so. I personally have never understood the need to drink whilst watching football, but maybe that’s just me?
My take on this debate was strengthened at this game in Cologne given that every close chance, every ‘poor’ refereeing decision and their eventual goal, resulted in Switzerland fans throwing their full cups of Bitburger towards the pitch. Their cups never made it to the pitch however, instead just hitting any photographer unlucky enough to be caught in the line of fire.
At full-time, I made a quick dash to the media centre in the hopes that Canon (who had a service centre at every venue) could quickly clean my cameras and fortunately, they had some very helpful staff on hand to do just that.
After an hour or so, I ventured out to the nearby metro stop and lo and behold, there were actually trams running. Fancy my luck! I boarded one that was actually on time and nearly empty. Success!
Things were going swimmingly right up until they suddenly weren’t. Our tram halted at a point along the journey and we were informed of something over the tannoy in German. Thankfully, a few locals were nice enough to translate for me and apparently what had happened was that an overly-enthusiastic Scotland supporter had managed to get run over by another tram ahead of us. This meant that we all had to disembark and find alternative methods of getting back into the city centre.
The only real method of getting back to my hotel that I had was to walk, so that’s what I did. My hotel was only four kilometres away, how hard could it be?
20 June 2024
Match 5. England v Denmark. Frankfurt-am-Main.
I’ll be honest. This is the first day where very little of note actually happened. England v Denmark was my one trip to Frankfurt properly during the tournament and even so I still managed to avoid Frankfurt-am-Main Hauptbahnhof, which I’m told is the worst station for crime in Germany. So that was a bonus.
My hotel for this game was in Wiesbaden, which meant that I couldn’t check-in until after the match thus leading to me trying to get all of my clothes through stadium security. I received a few strange looks!
The game itself was a remarkably unremarkable 1-1 draw, where the most notable aspect was the installation of a roof for the fixture due to poor weather throughout the days previous.
After the final whistle, I made it a mission not to head into town and instead found a direct S-Bahn service from the ‘Stadion’ station to Wiesbaden.
21 June 2024
Match 6. Slovakia v Ukraine. Düsseldorf.
The following morning, I had a relatively long journey to make for my next game in Düsseldorf. This was a late addition to my schedule as I’d managed to negotiate some extra passes for matches on days when I’d originally been rejected from another, normally more high-profile, match on the same day. Slovakia v Ukraine was not a game I had planned to cover until a few days prior, hence the slightly awkward placement of my hotel compared to the host city.
I managed to get back into Frankfurt fairly quickly on the S-Bahn, and changed trains at Frankfurt Airport station to board a direct ICE train to Düsseldorf. The journey from the Airport to Düsseldorf should take about an hour and a half and when I boarded there were around 5 hours until kickoff, giving me plenty of extra time to make it to the Merkur Spiel-Arena, home of Fortuna Düsseldorf. We reached Cologne with no issues and headed on to the final stop, when our train ground to a halt. We then spent a good two hours sitting in the same place on the tracks as another train had derailed ahead of us. By the time I got to Düsseldorf, kickoff was just forty-five minutes away and I still had to navigate the metro system to get to the stadium.
Thirty nervy minutes passed and I made it to the stadium. I didn’t have an allocated position for the match on account of being a late addition, so ran to the media centre to pick up a position card. Upon arrival, I was told they couldn’t assign me a position until it was confirmed by UEFA head office so I waited for about ten minutes and was eventually given a choice of spots. I made my selection and sprinted to the photographer’s entrance.
Four minutes into the match, I was finally in my photo position and was able to enjoy the next eighty-six minutes sat in torrential rain.
Getting back to Wiesbaden afterwards was a breeze, by the way.
22 June 2024
Match 7. Belgium v Romania. Cologne.
It’s probably an awful indictment of how hectic the previous ten days had gone as I legitimately have no recollection of any events on June 21th. I even went back through and checked my WhatsApp messages from the day to various people and the only notable tidbit I could find was that I was in a hotel with a door that wouldn’t close. So I had to push my cases up against the door in an attempt to make sure nobody came into the room overnight.
23 June 2024
Match 8. Scotland v Hungary. Stuttgart.
Scotland’s final group game was next and this was another game I was added to on short-notice after an accreditation rejection in a different game that day. Stuttgart is one of the more awkwardly placed cities for train travel in Germany. However, I was able to find a direct service to the city from Cologne which took just two hours.
I was in Stuttgart a good seven hours ahead of the 21:00 kickoff, but this was intentional as I planned on staying in Ludwigsburg, a city just over ten kilometres north of Stuttgart, so the early arrival gave me time to check-in ahead of the match.
Upon my return to Stuttgart Hauptbahnhof, I had a hard time navigating the station to find the correct U-Bahn line for the stop I needed for the stadium. I managed to jump onto the right line eventually and got onto the first metro train that came past. It wasn’t until about ten minutes in that I realised I was going in the complete opposite direction to where I had originally planned to go, meaning I had to get off and try and find my bearings.
Eventually, after about an hour of journeying, I was at the stadium. For this match, I was in the tribune as opposed to a pitchside position. This was the only match of the tournament where this would be the case so it was a good chance to try something new. Safe to say, it’s not my favourite position to work from.
24 June 2024
Match 9. Albania v Spain. Düsseldorf.
Another one of those nondescript days here with another trip to Düsseldorf. The journey from Ludwigsburg to Düsseldorf was fairly event-free, which was a bonus. I was starting to tire of the German train system. Trains are rarely cancelled, a marked difference from trains back home, however the delays everyday were making it tough to settle ahead of matches.
Upon arriving in Düsseldorf, I made sure to check into my hotel. This might have been the shadiest of all the hotels I’d stayed in thus far but fortunately it was only a short walk to the nearest metro station which had a direct line to the stadium. It was at this game where I finally took the plunge and paid for the food provided in the media centre and it was not cheap, ha!
I don’t remember much about the game, aside from the absolutely awful Spain away kit which made stock feel almost meaningless given the fact I had shot them in the red the week prior.
25 June 2024
Match 10. England v Slovenia. Cologne.
Another trip to Cologne beckoned the following day as England were playing their final group game against Slovenia. The previous two England results didn’t exactly fill the England supporters in my train carriage with confidence that the result tonight would be any better (spoiler: they were correct).
I arrived in Cologne in the mid-afternoon and made the trek to the same hotel I had stayed in for the Scotland game just a few days prior. You know, the one without the door locks. Upon arrival, I was given my keys and, wouldn’t you know it, I was in the exact same room! I’m not one for complaints, so I just intended on doing the same as I had previously although this time I made sure to lock up all my clothes in the wardrobe just to be safe.
An hour later I was at the RheinEnergieStadion for what would be the final time in this tournament. I’d already closed off my tournament in Frankfurt and this would chalk another off. I did know that a win or draw for England would force another trip to Gelsenkirchen however, so the 0-0 draw that followed damped my spirits a tad.
I did manage to pick up one of the few remaining Euro 2024 branded bucket hats though, so silver linings!
26 June 2024
Match 11. Ukraine v Belgium. Stuttgart.
Ten games in the previous twelve days and I had finally reached the final match of the group stages. Ukraine took on Belgium in Stuttgart and another chance for some useful stock work on a Belgium side who still featured some stars, despite their so-called ‘Golden Generation’ being a few years past at this point. So, as you can imagine, I was delighted when the Red Devils decided to walk out in a sky blue kit. Ukraine were in their traditional yellow.
On a plus note, this was possibly the least-subscribed match of the whole tournament. So much so, that it was quite easy to cover Belgium’s attack in both halves. Though it would have helped if the Belgian team decided to do any attacking, a fact not lost on their own supporters who began to boo and jeer their side for pretty much the entire final third of the match. I’ve not seen anything like it since the days of Adnan Cirak and Craig Hobson lining up up-top for Stockport County.
The most notable part of the day came much later, however, when I’d made it to Mannheim to check-in to yet another hotel. The hotel check-in wasn’t particularly notable but along the walk to the hotel itself I passed a number of bars showing the late kickoff that day, Georgia v Portugal. The noise from the bar who clearly had the legal stream as Georgia got their second soon spread across to what felt like the whole city as fans in every bar were rapturous in their support for the Georgians.
27-28 June 2024
My gap-days ahead of knockout stages were spent in Essen, a city in the Ruhr region. Essen is a useful hub for journeys to the other nearby cities of Mulheim, Duisburg, Wuppertal, Dortmund and Düsseldorf; and gave me my first chance to do some shopping and some cooking. Up until this point, I had basically been living from hotel to hotel and only being able to eat food at stadiums or at train stations. Priority number one, however, was to find a launderette. I’d packed about two weeks of clothes for the tournament with the plan to get everything clean at this stage of the competition. Little did I know that finding an open launderette would be so difficult.
After a day of Googling and searching what felt like every nook and cranny of Essen, I ran out of options. That was until I decided to just throw away all of the clothes I’d brought with me and instead wander to the Primark in the city centre - not my most fiscally responsible idea admittedly. Within an hour I was all packed with a new wardrobe and could finally relax.
What does one do when taking a break from Euro 2024? That’s right, they open up EAFC 24 (which was previously FIFA, for those unaware) and play a virtual version of the competition. I managed to win the Euros as England, surely that means it was meant to be for the Three Lions to take home the trophy, right?
29 June 2024
Match 12. Germany v Denmark. Dortmund.
A day later and we were back at it with the Round of 16. The Westfalenstadion, home of Borussia Dortmund, is the largest stadium in Germany and tonight would play host to the hosts as they looked to progress further on home soil. Their opponents, Denmark, had qualified in second place through England’s group.
There was photographer drama before most had even arrived at the stadium and the map provided to photographers showing which end the German supporters were stationed in was amended close to kickoff due to operational problems, not for the first time this tournament, and there were some very unhappy German photographers now sitting in front of Danish fans.
Everyone pitchside that day was going to lose in the end though as we were forecast very heavy thunderstorms towards the end of the game.
After an early Germany goal and celebration in my corner was chalked off, a gloom fell over the stadium. Across the next twenty minutes, you could see little flashes against the side of one of the stands. These flashes got bigger and bigger until suddenly there was a giant streak of lightning across the sky and referee Michael Oliver called for play to be halted. What followed was an almighty downpour, unlike anything I’d ever experienced at a match before. Frantically, I rushed to put away any laptops, cameras and bags and then bolted into the stand to hide. It wasn’t long before a number of colleagues and supporters followed suit.
After the rain delay, the game got back underway. Just after half-time, Denmark took the lead and ran celebrating into the corner I was sat in and, for the second time in the game, that goal was chalked off by VAR. Germany went on to win the game 2-0 at the other end of the pitch, which pretty much summed up how my luck at the tournament was going.
30 June 2024
Match 13. England v Slovakia. Gelsenkirchen.
Ah yes, Gelsenkirchen again for another England match. This time around, getting to the stadium was less of a challenge. The trams were still infrequent and still very busy, but at least I’d planned to set off early enough that I didn’t have to worry too much about any delays.
If not for some heroics from Jude Bellingham deep into injury time, England would have been sent packing. Sadly, I was blocked by a Slovakia defender for the big picture so I came away from the match with very little that was useful.
However, England’s progression through the tournament would hopefully help with accreditation acceptance for future matches as the competition moves closer to the final.
1 July 2024
Match 14. France v Belgium. Düsseldorf.
One bonus of the next day’s fixture was that at least it wasn’t too far away. In fact, I seemed to have been spending almost all of my time at this tournament in the Rhine-Ruhr region, which it turns out is the largest conurbation in Europe… There’s a question I’ll have to squeeze into my weekly quiz at some point. Dortmund, Gelsenkirchen, Düsseldorf and Cologne all hosted matches and there are significantly more large footballing cities in the area too - notably Leverkusen, Bochum, Bonn, Wuppertal, Duisburg, Essen and Oberhausen.
Looking ahead to the match itself, France were arguably the competition favourites going into the opening round of matches, but a lacklustre display in the group stages meant they looked less promising than some other nations. Their opponents in this match, Belgium, did look even worse though, so this game wasn’t being billed as a future classic.
That said, this was my first chance to shoot France at this tournament and a great chance to get some stuff on star player Kylian Mbappe in the famous blue kit of Les Bleus. So imagine my displeasure at the French side walking out in all-white. The game itself wasn’t particularly memorable, although my luck for goals and celebrations changed as Randal Kolo Muani scored a late winner for France before piling on top of the photographers sat in our corner of the pitch.
2 July 2024
Match 15. Romania v Netherlands. Munich.
The final day of the Round of 16 also provided my first real scare with public transport as I managed to miss my 06:39 direct train to Munich from Düsseldorf. Fortunately, because of my Interrail ‘Global’ pass, I was able to jump on any train I liked which allowed me to jump on the next one. This train, however, took a longer route via Stuttgart and thus added a good hour or two onto my journey.
Upon arrival in Munich, I rushed off to the Allianz Arena for the first time since the opening fixture. With Munich being so far south compared to all of the other cities at this tournament, it generally meant that travelling there for matches wasn’t particularly feasible with such short turnarounds between matches.
That being said, the location of Munich did mean that more photographers opted for the other game that day, in the more central city of Leipzig - the one stadium I missed throughout the tournament. This meant that there was plenty of room to work for the game between Romania and the Netherlands. The Dutch were another side I was yet to photograph and with a favourable side of the draw ahead of them, they actually stood a good chance of getting to the final from this point in the competition.
The Netherlands won what was a very colour game, with bright shades of orange behind me and the distinctive yellow of Romania’s supporters as a background at the other end.
3-4 July 2024
No Matches.
The Round of 16 was over almost as quickly as it started and another two ‘off-days’ lay ahead in Cologne. I’d planned on seeing some of the sights of the city when I arrived but instead was greeted by two days of torrential rain which made any prospects of doing anything productive with my time.
5 July 2024
Match 15. France v Portugal. Hamburg.
Back at it again after two days in Cologne and yet another lengthy train journey lay ahead, this time to the northern city of Hamburg, one of two stadiums I had yet to visit and the final unique stadium that I would work at. The journey up there was actually quite pleasant. No delays, an empty first-class carriage and the soothing sounds of my ‘easy listening’ Spotify playlist made for a delightful trip.
As was the case with most cities during my time in Germany, I didn’t see much of Hamburg proper. Instead just seeing a train station, a hotel and a stadium, but from the feedback I’d heard from some colleagues who’d spent a couple of days there prior to this match, it’s got an odd party vibe to it - i.e. not for James, clearly.
The match itself pitted arguably the two biggest star names of the competition against each other as France, captained by Kylian Mbappe, faced Portugal, captained by the all-time leading Euros goalscorer Cristiano Ronaldo. This was potentially my last chance to photograph the former Manchester United, Real Madrid and current Al Nassr forward who foreseeably would be retiring at some point in the near future.
While not a classic game, it took 120 minutes plus a penalty shootout to decide the outcome of the match as France progressed through to the semi-finals.
6 July 2024
Match 15. England v Switzerland. Düsseldorf.
The next morning, an early train journey from Hamburg-Atlona awaited me; however this time I had company as a number of colleagues were also travelling to Düsseldorf for England’s quarter-final. Three of us managed to acquire a booth in the carriage before three England supporters joined us for the rest of the journey beyond Hamburg Hauptbahnhof. I was impressed at one of our guest’s ability to sleep underneath two seats, not sure how he managed that one.
When we got to Düsseldorf, we all split off with differing plans. Two of my colleagues headed into town for a succulent chinese meal in Düsseldorf’s Chinatown, while I made my way to the stadium.
It was another case of a lucky escape for England, who defeated Switzerland on penalties after going behind in the first ninety minutes.
7-8 July 2024
No Matches.
With just three games left, part of me couldn’t wait until the final. After eight years of hard work, averaging 150+ football matches a season, it felt like the week ahead was to be arguably the biggest week of my career. Where better place to start that week than Nuremberg, where I would be spending the next two days ahead of the semi-finals.
I managed to get out a bit more on this occasion compared to the opening week of the tournament and was able to catch-up with some colleagues who were staying at the hotel across the road.
9 July 2024
Match 16. Spain v France. Munich.
Semi-final number one took place in Munich as Spain took on France in arguably the more interesting-sounding of the two semi finals. Spain had been the best side I’d seen up to that point, although I had only seen them once admittedly.
I also used this game to collect a good amount of souvenirs pre-match as it was my last real chance to do so uninterrupted by fans arriving. I picked up a keyring, a miniature version of competition mascot Albärt and copious amounts of trading cards as Topps clearly just wanted to get rid of all of their stock for free. I also paid for someone else to get a free beer just so I could attain one of the Euro-branded cups, which sadly you couldn’t purchase without an alcoholic beverage.
I don’t remember much about the game that followed, aside from sixteen year old Lamine Yamal scoring a great goal from the edge of the box.
After the game, rumbles of thefts on the trains started to pass through the photographer’s room as we heard of one photographer from the UK having all of his cameras stolen from his bag as he slept on the train. Not the ideal way for one to finish their tournament.
10 July 2024
Match 17. England v Netherlands. Dortmund.
Those who know me or who spoke to me after the Euros are probably expecting this day’s entry to be lengthy, and you’re in luck. Strap in for one of the worst days of my life.
The morning started like any other, with an early train. This journey would take me from Munich to Essen, before I would then check-in to a hotel and eventually head onto Dortmund for the second semi-final. Upon boarding the train, I placed my ThinkTank suitcase over my head in the overhead luggage rack before struggling to find a place to put my rucksack containing my 400mm lens and some other cables and wires. I sat on the train for five hours while editing the previous night’s photos, only leaving my seat once for thirty seconds to go to the toilet. Now, I’d noticed nothing untoward all journey, aside from a worry about my cameras based on the news of the colleague having his cameras stolen the day before but I was sat next to a television journalist on the train and so I felt like I could at least trust those around me on the train should anything go wrong.
Anyways, moving on, I get to Essen which is the final stop for this train. I retrieve my rucksack from the other side of the carriage before pulling down my suitcase… my suitcase which was now significantly less heavy than I remember it being. I didn’t even have to open the case to know what had happened. The bag was empty. All of my cameras and lenses had been removed and I didn’t really know how to react. Now, my 400mm in my rucksack was still there, so the would-be thief had clearly targeted just the one bag and had no idea of the value of the kit in the other bag. The journalist I was sitting next to and his colleague who was sat further down the carriage helped me speak to the police on the platform, at which point I was informed that German trains don’t have any CCTV whatsoever due to some German states having different privacy laws apparently. I still had to check-in to my hotel so I did so while trying to consider my options.
There were some positives. I still had my accreditation and I still had my passport. If they had just taken the whole suitcase, I would have been completely screwed.
I went back to Essen station to be told to go to Dortmund to file a police report. When I got to Dortmund, I rushed to the Bundespolizei office in the station and filed my report. I was given a crime number and told not to expect a resolution due to the supposed quality of the thieves. I then headed to the Westfalenstadion for the match with just a 400mm lens, three batteries and some CFexpress cards. Upon arrival I rushed to Canon’s support centre who had kindly put aside some replacement cameras for me. I then told other photographers what had happened, which I can assure you was one of the most humiliating feelings I’ve ever experienced. I just felt so stupid, especially given that we were just talking about another photographer’s theft the day before. How could I, someone who is so used to the perils of getting the train, let my equipment be stolen so easily?
Anyway, the match was fast approaching and it was an England semi-final, a massive fixture that I wished I was able to shoot with my own cameras. I was incredibly grateful to Canon for their help. However, due to not having my settings saved on a card, I was stuck trying to remember how I had my camera setup previously.
As kickoff approached, dark storm clouds gathered overhead. This was Dortmund after all, where I’d had a game stopped due to weather just two weeks prior. I quickly covered my bags with a rain cover and bolted to the stands. After the rain finally stopped, the game kicked off and an early Netherlands goal seemed like it would be the sucker punch to England’s hopes of winning the tournament until the Three Lions won a penalty just ten minutes later. Harry Kane scored and ran towards our corner to celebrate. When I went to send those photos at half-time, my laptop decided it was now time to update itself so I was left unable to wire any photos. My laptop refused to turn on after the update and so I had to wait until full-time to run up to the press centre upstairs to send anything. By that point, Ollie Watkins had already put England through to the final. When I got to the press centre, my laptop finally turned on, but now the keyboard wasn’t working. It was just typing two different letters everytime I clicked any key. I restarted it again and this time it threw a different warning at me. The laptop wasn’t even registering that it had a hard drive installed and wouldn’t go beyond an error screen. This wasn’t good.
It was somewhere in this chaos when I got a call from an unknown German number, so naturally I ignored it. They rang again about five minutes later and I did eventually pick up. It was a German police officer calling from the Bundespolizei office in Frankfurt-am-Main railway station. He confirmed that it was me who had reported a theft and then proceeded to tell me that they had arrested a suspect with a considerable amount of camera equipment on their person that the police believed was stolen. They asked if I could travel to Frankfurt that night for an interview, bearing in mind that this was close to midnight at this point.
I explained where I was and where I would be for the next few days which led to them asking me to travel to Dortmund station again to give a more-thorough interview. I obliged and headed back into Dortmund, where I was greeted by a lovely German police officer and his two English colleagues who were there providing translation services for me.
At 3AM, I was finally out of the interview and headed back into Essen, none the wiser as to whether any of the cameras retrieved were mine.
11-13 July 2024
No Matches.
One day removed from the theft and my laptop still wasn’t working. I think the rain pre-match yesterday had caused terminal damage to it. I had yet to send any photos from the match and had a train due to Berlin just after midday. This gave me two hours to rummage around Essen to try and find a working laptop to use. I eventually stumbled upon Saturn, a German equivalent of a Comet (do they still exist?) or PC World back home. I found a laptop that was up to the standards I needed for work and went to purchase it - big shoutout to my younger brother Wayne for helping fund that purchase, without him I’d probably still not have a working laptop!
When I got back to the hotel, I turned on the laptop and tried to get to work. What I stupidly didn’t consider was that this Asus Vivobook I had purchased in a German electronics chain, in Germany, would be installed in German with no option to change to language - not to mention the fact that the keyboard has a different layout too. It took me half an hour to navigate through Google Chrome in German before working out that to be able to use English as a language, I would need to reinstall Windows.
A slightly panicky hour followed as I rushed to install Windows as well as all of my applications I’d need just to be able to work for the next few days before boarding my train to Berlin. I’d gone from a very confident train-goer to now being afraid that every person sitting near me would try and steal my bags. A healthy bit of paranoia is probably fine but I was overdoing it a tad.
The journey to Berlin was the point where it finally hit me how much losing those cameras was going to ruin the next few weeks or even months for me. And getting to Berlin, my favourite city in the country, didn’t exactly brighten my spirits. That said, I managed to get all of my editing done on the train, so silver linings and all that.
The following morning, things improved drastically as my fiancée flew out from Manchester to spend the next week with me in Germany and it was much needed!
14 July 2024
Match 18. England v Spain. Berlin
Final Day. My 1000th football match photographed and what a game to be able to shoot. My first men’s senior continental final and England to have made it to the final was beyond what I could have expected. The queue to get into the stadium was pretty lengthy and unfortunately we were struck with a pretty hefty thunderstorm in the hour leading up to the final. I was getting a bit tired of getting wet now.
Canon were incredibly helpful again, providing me with some loan equipment to cover the match. The spot I had selected was down the side in front of the Spanish fans. A position that worked out quite nicely when Nico Williams of Spain found himself through on goal before running to our corner to celebrate. Cole Palmer gave England hope briefly with an equaliser but that hopes quickly faded as Mikel Oyarzabal scored a late winner for the Spaniards to take home the UEFA Euro 2024.
What followed was a pretty rough run-around after the game as the 100+ photographers surrounded the Spain players when they came over the advertising hoardings to celebrate with their supporters, this lasted a good forty minutes.
When it was all said and done, silence fell on the Olympiastadion as the UEFA Euro 2024 competition had come to a dramatic end.
Epilogue
And that was my Euro 2024. I’ll be honest, from a photo perspective I didn’t come away from the tournament happy and having all of my cameras stolen just two games from the end really put a damper on things. I'll be forever grateful to Danehouse for giving me the opportunity to travel out to Germany and cover the tournament as well as my beautiful fiancée Rheanna for putting up with me being away for so long. Here’s to the next one!
By the way, if you’d like to see some of my work from the tournament, please click this link to be taken to a selection of images across the competition, or this link to see every photo sent across the month.
Epilogue to the Epilogue
So I’m writing this at the end of August and there have been some developments since the tournament. I was informed of the ongoing police investigation as it was happening and I had very little confirmation as to what cameras the police had recovered. On August 26th, I received an email from my correspondent in Frankfurt who informed me that all of the equipment that had been stolen (three Canon bodies and three Canon lenses) were currently sitting in an office in Frankfurt-am-Main station. They then told me that I would have to travel to Frankfurt to collect. This was a Monday, and by Thursday morning I had touched down in Germany once more to get what was mine.
To go from the single lowest moment of my life professionally to being able to recover from it by getting my cameras back was something that I never expected to happen. I expected to be in insurance hell for months. I’ll be eternally grateful to the Bundespolizei for their help in sorting out this mess. It taught me a valuable lesson in making sure that above everything else, I needed to be more vigilant both abroad and back home.