Just the other day we were watching Nestory Irankunda do backflips, only a week after Cortnee Vine played the pass of the century at Accor Stadium and Real Madrid took out the Champions League at Wembley. We were looking forward to a break from football. No chance.

The European Championships have come around so quickly since the end of the A-League season and the season-ending international fixtures, that keeping tabs on all things Euro 2024 has been very difficult. I know I’m not alone. I go into this tournament as a casual observer at best, but I know that at the end of the first weekend’s action, I will be deeply invested, sleep-deprived and thoroughly entertained by the incredible football on show in Germany.

Countries with new names, seriously unfancied football nations along with the usual crème de la crème will all be in action three times in a congested first 12 days. And just the anticipation of the sunny footage of the boozy fan zones, the unveiling of new villains and heroes on the field and the sunburnt faces of the Tartan Army is enough to get a lot of us out of bed early on Saturday morning to take in the opening fixture, if not the opening ceremony and the tribute to the late Franz Beckenbauer.

The first round of games will give us so much to talk about. Dark horse Switzerland have punched above their weight in recent tournaments and they will score a famous win against much-fancied Hungary as the tournament explodes to life in Cologne.

Likewise, Poland will belie their lowly status, qualifying behind the Czech Republic and Albania, to stun Ronald Koeman’s Dutch superstars in Hamburg. Slovenia and Denmark had almost identical records in qualifying, in the same group, and will give us the first draw.

Turkey will demolish Georgia, who qualified via some incredibly generous quirk of the qualifying process that allowed some lowly-ranked nations to enter the second-chance saloon through the Nations League back door. The round will end with an entertaining draw, Patrik Schick giving us another wonder goal to cancel out Bruno Fernandes’ opener as Portugal get off to a stuttering start against the Czechs.

Elsewhere, the favourites will all be untroubled, Romelu Lukaku getting his tournament off to a flyer with a hat-trick for Belgium against Slovakia, while a revamped England hold on for a win against Serbia after Jordan Pickford’s early dismissal and an Aleksandar Mitrovic-inspired second-half comeback. Germany will wow the Munich crowd in that opening fixture, dispatching a spirited Scotland side, roared on by a vocal crowd, Spain and Croatia will give us the first battle of the giants with the Spanish prevailing in Berlin, and Italy will demolish Albania to get off to a surprisingly strong start to their championship defence. Ukraine will record a statement win against Romania while France will find out just how tough the Austrians are, relying on a last-minute winner from Kylian Mbappé to take the win.

By the end of the first round of games, Euro 2024 will already have shown us exactly how VAR should be used in-stadium. The referees will be picky about time-wasting to prevent the added-time blowouts from the World Cup. The handball rule will continue to cause utter confusion in a number of games, where inconsistent calls and varying VAR decisions provoke an urgent re-appraisal of the rulebook ahead of the second round of games. And in a head-scratching development, we will see coaches punished with cards for being outside their technical area by over-zealous fourth officials.

There is a whole month of drama and excitement to come, but just sticking my neck out I have the hosts as surprise winners, Italy as runners-up and Lukaku as the nailed-on golden boot winner. Welcome to Germany. This is going to be an incredible month of football.

Anyone care to share their predictions? I know you’ll be watching.