Olympic Football: What`s up with Europe?

Europe boasted of a contingent of four teams, more than any other continent was allowed, in their Olympic campaign. The World Cup winners Italy were there, along with former winners Belgium, football powerhouse Holland and qualifiers Serbia. What went wrong? This question begs to be asked as Europe was unable to get a medal and indeed in spite of a numerical advantage as far as the number of teams goes, only managed to get one side into the quarter finals. Belgium getting to the quarter finals was a bit of a disappointment as they were flattened in their remaining matches conceding an alarming seven goals in two matches in the process. Olympic football is mainly made up of younger players 23 and under. In today's club football scene this age is however no longer considered young. Every player who took part was a professional. To put age in perspective we could refer to European club star Cristiano Ronaldo 23 or Euro sensation Fernando Torres 24 ... (link)