Euro's expanded format was a bad idea, but knockouts should be better

The phony war at the European Championship is over. Let the games begin. Playing 36 matches for the expedient of reducing 24 teams to a final 16 proved as bad an idea on grass as it always looked on paper.

UEFA have essentially come up with a scheme to reward failure as four third-place teams sail into the knockout rounds.

A return of fewer than two goals per game is not good entertainment, and it's hard to believe the new format had nothing to do with that. France's tepid goalless draw with Switzerland is 90 minutes of our lives we will never get back.

Under the old system, Portugal and Cristiano Ronaldo would be flying home. Now, with three draws, they are parachuted into the soft side of the draw for the knockout rounds.

Against that, there have still been some compelling plotlines -- Wales, Ireland, Hungary, Northern Ireland, Slovakia and, best of all, Iceland. The land of geysers and volcanoes, population 330,000, is the top story of the tournament. The Ice Men are remarkably unbeaten and are now plunged into a match against the England and the Premier League heroes they watch on TV every week.

This is far from the formality some might imagine for an England team that have struggled to turn domination into wins. Lose this and manager Roy Hodgson will surely be out of a job. It would be the nation's biggest humiliation since 1950 when England lost unthinkably to a then unconsidered USA at the World Cup.

2016, and send Sweden tumbling out.