SOCCER/ Euro 2004: For UEFA's official Euro 2004 website, the organisation had, before the tournament, various established coaches from across the Continent cast an eye over the competing nations and assess their prospects in the competition. Emmet Malone reports from Lisbon

Carlos Queiroz was unfortunate enough to be presented with the Greeks, and last night, after Otto Rehhagel's side had shocked the hosts and made off with the silverware, the prediction that "they are not going to do much" and "will naturally start to be found out" still sat there to be laughed at.

None of which, of course, proves anything except how easy it is to be made look a fool with the benefit of hindsight.

Look back at their run of six straight wins in the qualifiers, the away defeat of Spain and their impressive win over Portugal in the opening game of this tournament and it is easy to see now the signs that Rehhagel had brought something to this little-known group of Greek players which had somehow transformed them into serious contenders.

The reality is, however, that scarcely anybody outside of their most devoted supporters could really have believed that, having been slightly fortunate to come out of their group when only a late goal in the 2-1 defeat by Russia earned them their place in the last eight, they could possibly go on to beat France, the Czech Republic and then Portugal again to become European champions.

Only the Czechs had produced any hard evidence of possessing a better side than the Greeks in those three knock-out games. While the defending champions and hosts were both outfought and persistently frustrated, Karel Bruckner's side, even after the loss through injury of Pavel Nedved, carved out enough opportunities to win through to the final.

The difference was that the Greeks took their chances at every stage of this competition.

It's not that Rehhagel had bad raw material to work with over the past three years either. Five prominent members of his squad featured in the Greek under-21 side that reached the European final back in 1998, many have regular experience of European club football and several others have done reasonably well in major European leagues.

They are clearly a group of players that were serious to begin with and then they showed a willingness to apply themselves to their new coach's master-plan.

Certainly the German's observation that one of his first tasks after taking over as coach was to persuade his players not to sit up half the night drinking coffee is the sort of complaint that most of his counterparts in our neck of the woods would probably settle rather happily for.

The generally negative approach aside (and after the Jack Charlton years it is difficult for us to harp on about that too much), it is hard to fault either Rehhagel or his players for their performances over the past three weeks. They may indeed have been defensive, but unlike England, for instance, they never stopped posing an attacking threat even after they had scored, and against Spain they showed that, when the situation required it, they could come from behind against one of the big names.

Their equaliser in that game was scored by Angelos Charisteas, just one of many pieces of living, breathing evidence of Rehhagel's ability to get the very best out of players.

The team's skipper, Theodoros Zagorakis (named yesterday as the player of the tournament), failed to make much of an impact at Leicester City; its imposing centre half Traianos Dellas couldn't make the grade at Sheffield United; and Charisteas, though a decent performer last season at Werder Bremen, scored three goals in six games here compared to four in 24 with the Bundesliga outfit.

Having achieved so much with this side, however, Rehhagel may well now be tempted to get out while the going simply cannot get any better.

In the qualifying stages of the next World Cup the Greeks are in a tricky-looking group with Turkey and Denmark, and the coach will not need to be told how much lower his stock would be if his side fails to qualify, just as the Danes, European champions in 1992, missed out on a place at USA 94 to Ireland on the basis of the number of goals scored.

Rehhagel is a prickly character who believes he still has a point to prove back in Germany, where, for all his success, he is not generally viewed with the regard he himself feels he deserves.

There is, nevertheless, a growing campaign to have the German football federation offer him the post of national coach, and, given the dearth of talent available to whomever succeeds Rudi Völler, it is not that difficult to see the attraction of appointing a strong man with a proven plan.

As for the rest, there is much work to do, and big names like France, Italy and Spain, in particular, face the prospect of significant overhauls under new coaches before there is much chance of pride being restored.

The failure of those teams to shine at this tournament was surely what will prevent it from going down in history as a great footballing spectacle.

For just a week, starting with the game of the competition, the meeting between the Netherlands and the Czech Republic, and ending with Portugal's quarter-final defeat of England, it blossomed, but the knockout stages never quite fulfilled our hopes or expectations.

For the Portuguese, however, even allowing for their temporary dismay at the outcome of Sunday's final, Euro 2004 has been an acknowledged triumph.

Though there have undoubtedly been other related costs, including major infrastructural investments prompted by the event, the price tag for staging the competition is put at around €1 billion.

For that they built magnificent stadiums up and down the country, which will continue the revitalisation of their domestic game, and generated huge and justified national pride among the country's 10 million people.

They also staged, for the hundreds of thousands of foreigners who visited during the past month, an invariably good-natured party that will not be quickly forgotten.

At the weekend there were reports that Charlie McCreevy would have roughly the above-mentioned sum, €1 billion, more than anticipated to play with come budget time this year.

Would that he could muster the vision to earn anything like the return that the Portuguese have managed through Euro 2004.