The date is set. On July 11, football fans around the world can forget everything that is wrong with the outside world for at least 90 minutes and finally witness who is the winner of one of the most watched sports in the world. England and Italy are fighting for the 2020 UEFA European Football Championship or Euro 2020, the coveted trophy that only comes every two years.

Here’s a little thought experiment for all of the casual soccer fans out there: Try to think of every active soccer player that you can think of. If the aforementioned athletes are all relatively old and compete in the top tournaments in the world, then it is very likely that they will represent their country at this year’s European Championship 2020.

To really put things in perspective, a recent study showed that a staggering 23.8 million viewers watched Britain’s historic Euro 2020 victory over Denmark, with the final 5 minutes of the exciting semi-finals drawing the most viewers. In fact, the event’s audience numbers were only recently dwarfed by the UK Prime Minister’s coronavirus announcement in May, which was followed by nearly 27 million on six different local news channels.

This finale promises to be a blast

A month of intense and exciting football has passed and now it is time for the two remaining top dogs, Italy and England, to battle it out at the historic Wembley Stadium.

In the past, the tournament has overcome many European heavyweights. It should be remembered, however, that this time around, Italy’s Azzurri have not lost a single game in 33 appearances for their country, leaving them minutes away from making their name into football history. Another Step.

Their opponent England, also known as the Three Lions, also had a strong game at this Euro 2020. They’ve only conceded one goal in their entire season, which is an impressive feat considering the competition they face – countries like Germany, the Czech Republic and Ukraine – to make it to the final. Overall, the ranks of both teams look stacked and on paper this fight should and likely will turn out to be a horror movie.

As you would expect, there will be plenty of bets on this game with bookies betting a slight advantage on England which should come as a surprise given the unbeaten streak of the team, Italy. However, the importance of home advantage in football should not be underestimated, no matter how many Italians get through to see the final in person.

After all, with the advent of blockchain casinos and the increasing adoption of crypto around the world, more and more crypto investors seem to have started using their crypto assets for gambling. Hence, it is obvious that many of these people can bet on this game as well, either through crypto gambling platforms or even through prediction markets.

How to Join: The Crypto Way

Over the past few years, the growing list of mainstream soccer clubs continues to introduce their own digital currencies / fan tokens. And while the jury is still divided on the real usefulness of these services, the fact remains that the world of football has been very adept at recognizing technological and monetary proposals based on electricity.

When it comes to betting, there are dozens of established gambling sites that accept a variety of cryptocurrencies – including Bitcoin (BTC), Litecoin (LTC), Bitcoin Cash (BCH), Dogecoin (DOGE), Tether (USDT), Ethereum (ETH), and many more. There are so many options out there and in the end it is just a matter of one person which platform to use.

It goes without saying that some betting sites are now offering their users multiple side bets – another aspect of online gambling that crypto enthusiasts can participate in. For example, the chances of Italy dropping out of the league as the top team are currently 10/11. For Great Britain this number is significantly lower with a ratio of 10/1.

Unfortunately, from a streaming perspective, there are currently no number of mainstream streaming services that accept crypto payments. However, betting portals have really improved their game over the past few years, with most platforms now offering top notch live streams that players can access anytime, anywhere, as long as they have enough tokens (usually not many) in their wallet.

Cryptocurrencies are becoming increasingly popular in the football world

One way or another, the cryptocurrency appears to have made its way onto the football field, as was recently revealed when a fan literally walked onto the field wearing a t-shirt marked “WTF Coin” during Belgium’s clash with Finland. In fact, the event was so well received that almost every major sports paper covered the story within hours of the invasion. As a result, people discovered that WTF – Walnut Finance – is truly a productive farming project.

In addition, the Euro 2020 governing body, i.e. the Union of European Football Associations (UEFA), recently signed a five-year global cooperation agreement in the field of blockchain technology with AntChain, a subsidiary of the Ant Group, Alipay, one of the largest digital payment platforms .

Under the agreement, UEFA and AntChain will work closely to use blockchain technology to not only promote the game, but also digitize the global football scene. In this regard, it stands to reason that given the unique commercialization / ownership opportunities of this explosive asset class, the two parties are likely to choose to explore the NFT sector.

In the near future, however, the winner of this year’s Golden Shoe of Euro 2020 (ie the player with the most goals) will be awarded the “Alipay Trophy”. In addition, the top scorer’s record is stored on an immutable blockchain system.

Regarding NFTs, it should be mentioned that the decentralized fantasy sports platform Rage Fan has been broadcasting limited edition NFT mints for the past week to celebrate the Euro 2020 tournament, which kicks off on July 11th when England and Italy at Wembley Stadium meet.

Players past and present have quickly embraced cryptocurrencies

It’s no secret that athletes from around the world continue to adopt cryptocurrencies at a rapid pace. In terms of football alone, no one promotes cryptocurrencies more than Andrés Iniesta, Carles Puyol and Gerard Piqué, three players who have represented Spain and Barcelona during their careers.

In fact, the trio have been pretty pragmatic in their crypto outlook, with Iniesta and Puyol being the co-founders of Olyseum, a blockchain-based social platform designed to reward collaboration and bring fans and stars closer together. Meanwhile, Piqué has opened up about his investments in the crypto-powered fantasy soccer game Sorare. The French superstar Antoine Griezmann is also said to have invested in the platform.

Ryan Babel, the once-respected Dutch wing and Bitcoin proponent, is highlighted by the fact that over the past year or so he has repeatedly shared his optimism about the market encourage Folks, especially his teammates, to buy BTC.

What is a player’s potential transfer cost in BTC?

This is definitely a question that needs to be answered.

Here’s a quick rundown of the transfer values ​​for the 11 starters (possibly) on both teams going into the finals just to see how much Bitcoin the money can buy.

According to the data available, the valuation of the eleven English teams starts at 570 million euros (718.5 million US dollars), while captain and star striker Harry Kane puts it at 120 million euros. On the Italian side, the total is 411 million euros (488.7 million US dollars), of which 60 million euros go to the 22-year-old goalkeeper of AC Milan, Gianluigi Donnarumma.

That brings the two teams’ combined valuations to € 981 million (nearly $ 1.2 billion). This one has around 35,800 BTC at the time of writing, which can be purchased with the above amount.