With Spain knocked out earlier this week, Italy last night crashed out of the tournament.
And tonight could see Germany – which along with England, Italy and Spain, represent the biggest soccer markets – return home early too.
It plays its final group game tonight, with either it or Holland coming home early.
The popularity of the tournament in those regions has been highlighted by the recent batch of TV figures.
The audience for the Germany v Netherlands game drew a peak audience of 26m – higher than that for all of Germany’s 2002 World Cup games, except the final which drew 27.1m.
Meanwhile Holland’s NED channel’s coverage pulled in 84.3 percent of the TV viewing public.
England’s qualification for the quarter-finals was seen in the UK by more than 20m viewers – peaking at a 72 percent audience share and the biggest ratings for the tournament in the UK so far. The game was shown on the BBC.
