Italy Explodes in Joy upon Winning Euro 2021

Italy’s fans celebrate in Rome, Monday, July 12, 2021, after Italy beat England to win the Euro 2020 soccer championships in a final played at Wembley stadium in London. Italy beat England 3-2 in a penalty shootout after a 1-1 draw. (AP Photo/Riccardo De Luca)

Addis Ababa, July 12, 2021 (Walta) – A cacophony of honking cars, fireworks, and singing fans filled the night in Rome as thousands of people took to the streets after Italy beat England in a penalty shootout Sunday to win its first major football trophy since the 2006 World Cup.

“We are coming out of a difficult year and a half which has left us exhausted, like other countries in the world,” said Fabrizio Galliano, a 29-year-old from Naples who watched the match on a big screen in downtown Rome. “This means so much. Sport is one of the things that unite us, among all the things that separate us. But to finally be able to feel that joy that we’ve been missing, it goes beyond sports.”

Soccer Football – Euro 2020 – Final – Italy v England – Wembley Stadium, London, Britain – July 11, 2021, Italy players celebrate with the trophy after winning Euro 2020 Pool via REUTERS/Laurence Griffiths

Many Italians saw the European Championship as a relaunch for a country that spent much of the past 16 months in various stages of lockdown. Italy was the first country outside Asia to get hit by the Covid-19 pandemic and suffered immensely, particularly in the spring of 2020 when hospitals in northern Italy were overwhelmed with patients and the death toll soared. Italy has recorded more than 127,000 Covid-19 deaths, the highest in the 27-nation European Union.

Shoulder to shoulder, fans nervously watched the penalty shootout on two big screens set up on Piazza del Popolo, an elliptical cobblestone square at the edge of Rome’s historic center. A deafening roar rose to the sky as Italy goalkeeper Gianluigi Donnarumma saved England’s last penalty.

Among the sea of blue Italy, shirts were an immigrant family from Senegal, who came from the town of Zagarolo, an hour outside Rome, to experience the final with the crowd in the piazza, according to France24.