The UEFA European Championship is one of the major competitive international football tournaments, first played in 1960. The finals stage of the tournament takes place every four years, with a qualifying competition beforehand. The sixteenth tournament was held across Europe in 2021 (postponed from 2020 due to the COVID-19 pandemic).
The England national football team first attempted to qualify for the finals of the tournament in 1964, having declined to enter in 1960. They first qualified in 1968, and have since participated in the finals on eleven occasions, including in 1996, when they were the host nation and thus did not need to qualify.
England's best performances at the finals were a runner-up finish at Euro 2020, when they lost the final to Italy on penalties at Wembley, and at Euro 2024, when they lost the final 2âÂÂ1 to Spain in Berlin, being the first team to lose consecutive European Championship finals. They had a third-place finish in Italy in 1968, when only four teams competed in the finals tournament, and reached one further semi-final in 1996, losing to Germany, also on home soil and on penalties. The team reached the quarter-finals on two other occasions, losing to host nation Portugal on penalties in 2004 and to Italy in Ukraine in 2012, also on penalties.
England were eliminated in the round of 16 by Iceland in 2016. On the other four occasions (1980, 1988, 1992 and 2000), they did not progress beyond the group stage.
Matches
As the competition ran during the 2024 general election, the Football Association contacted players to remind them about arranging proxy votes or postal votes.