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    Euro 2020: How to pronounce the name of the players correctly?

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    Euro 2020 is just around the corner after a 12-month delay because of the COVID-19 pandemic. The tournament is about to start on 11th June with Italy taking on Turkey.

    In the build-up of the Euro 2020, UEFA has released a guideline on how to pronounce the name of the Euro 2020 players correctly. You’ll be surprised to know that we have often mispronounced the name of many players for the entire duration of their careers.

    So let’s check out the correct pronunciation of the players’ name to root for them loudly during Euro 2020.

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    AUSTRIA

    Basic German-language rules apply – note that an umlauted ‘ä’, ‘ö’ or ‘ü’ sounds something similar to ‘ae’, ‘oe’, ‘ue’ in English.

    Stefan Lainer – Liner
    Philipp Lienhart – Leen-hart
    Alessandro Schöpf – Sherpf
    Karim Onisiwo – Onni-see-vo
    Sasa Kalajdzic – Sasha Kal-ide-jitch

    BELGIUM

    Some names are pronounced the Flemish way, and some the French way.

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    Toby Alderweireld – Al-der-way-reld
    Michy Batshuayi – Bat-shoe-a-yi
    Timothy Castagne – Cast-an-yer
    Thibaut Courtois – Tee-bo Cor-twa
    Thomas Meunier – Muh-nee-ay
    Simon Mignolet – Min-yo-let
    Thomas Vermaelen – Ver-mah-len

    CROATIA

    Basic rules: ‘š’ is a ‘sh’, ‘č’ and ‘ć’ are a bit like an English ‘ch’, and ‘j’ approximates to an English ‘y’.

    Milan Badelj – Bad-el-ee
    Luka Ivanušec – Eevan-oo-shets
    Mislav Oršić – Orsh-itch
    Šime Vrsaljko – Shi-may Ver-sal-ee-ko

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    CZECH REPUBLIC

    Accents on vowels indicate where the pronunciation should be stressed (so ‘Tomáš’ is more like ‘Tom-aash’ for English speakers). An ‘š’ is a ‘sh’, a ‘č’ is a ‘ch’, but ‘c’ is more like a ‘ts’. And ‘ř’ is a bit like ‘rj’ in English.

    Jan Bořil – Yan Borjil
    Ondřej Čelůstka – Ondjay Chell-oost-ka
    Adam Hložek – H-lozhek
    Tomáš Holeš – Hollesh
    Pavel Kadeřábek – Kadder-jah-beck
    Aleš Matějů – Alesh Mattay-oo
    Jiří Pavlenka – Yeer-zhee
    Jakub Pešek – Pesheck
    Petr Ševčík – Shev-cheek
    Tomáš Vaclík – Vatz-leek

    DENMARK

    That ‘æ’ character is widely misunderstood among English speakers, while a ‘g’ tends to be much softer than it looks.

    Simon Kjær – Care
    Pierre-Emile Højbjerg – Hoy-byer
    Jonas Lössl – Yo-nass Lussel
    Joakim Mæhle – May-leh
    Frederik Rønnow – Rern-oh

    ENGLAND

    All pretty simple.

    FINLAND

    Vowels and accents can make a language more treacherous than it first appears (a Finnish ‘ä’ sounds much like the English ‘a’ in ‘hat’).

    Nikolai Alho – Arl-hoh
    Paulus Arajuuri – Ara-yoo-ree
    Jasin Assehnoun – Asser-known
    Nicholas Hämäläinen – Hama-lay-nen
    Lukas Hradecky – Lukash Radetski
    Juhani Ojala – O-yalla
    Teemu Pukki – Pooky
    Sauli Väisänen – Vay-san-en

    FRANCE

    The vowels often confound English speakers. So do the consonants.

    Lucas Digne – Loo-cah Dee-nyuh
    Olivier Giroud – Ol-iv-ee-eh Ji-roo
    Antoine Griezmann – On-twan Gree-ez-man
    N’Golo Kanté – N-go-lo Kon-tay
    Clément Lenglet – Long-lay
    Steve Mandanda – Stev Mon-don-dah
    Mike Meignan – Mane-yoh
    Marcus Thuram – Too-ram

    GERMANY

    An umlaut on ‘ä’, ‘ö’ or ‘ü’ is comparable to ‘ae’, ‘oe’, ‘ue’ in English. Note: Joshua Kimmich – ‘ich’ as in “ich bin ein Berliner” rather than Baby You’re A Rich Man.

    Manuel Neuer – Noy-ah
    İlkay Gündoğan – Eel-kay Goon-doe-wan
    Emre Can – Jan
    Joshua Kimmich – Kim-ikh

    HUNGARY

    One of the few European languages that do not belong to the Indo-European group, Hungarian is not as percussive-sounding as it looks.

    Tamás Cseri – Tom-ash Cherry
    Dénes Dibusz – Day-nesh Di-boos
    Péter Gulácsi – Pay-ter Goo-lat-chi
    Ákos Kecskés – Ah-kosh Ketch-kay-sh
    Gergő Lovrencsics – Ger-gur Lov-ren-chitch
    Ádám Nagy – Nah-dge
    Szabolcs Schön – Saw-bolch Shern
    Attila Szalai – Saw-law-ee

    ITALY

    The commonly-made mistake is to pronounce a ‘ch’ like an English ‘ch’ – it is more like a ‘k’. Lorenzo Insigne is a tough one to get spot on – linguists may note that his ‘gn’ works like a Spanish ‘ñ’.

    Federico Bernardeschi – Ber-nar-desk-ee
    Giorgio Chiellini – Jor-joe Key-eh-lean-ee
    Federico Chiesa – Kee-ay-sah
    Alessio Cragno – Cran-yo
    Lorenzo Insigne – In-sin-yuh

    NETHERLANDS

    The gg sound is like the Scottish ‘loch’. The ‘ij’ doesn’t have a direct English equivalent, but is softer than the ‘i’ sound in ‘fine’ (and more like the Scottish ‘aye’, or ‘why’). The ‘ou’ is more pronounced than the English ‘out’ – it’s like ‘ah-ou’ run together; so think of the ‘ow’ when you bang your elbow on a doorframe.

    Steven Bergwijn – Stay-ven Berugg-why-n
    Matthijs de Ligt – Mat-ice Dull-icht
    Marten de Roon – Der-own
    Stefan de Vrij – Stay-fon Duh-fray
    Quincy Promes – Pro-mess
    Donny van de Beek – Fun der-bake
    Wout Weghorst – Vowt Vegg-horst
    Georginio Wijnaldum – Why-naldum
    Owen Wijndal – Whyne-dal

    NORTH MACEDONIA

    North Macedonian names are transliterated from the Cyrillic alphabet so the hard work should have been done for you, but there are a few hazardous ones out there.

    Visar Musliu – Moos-lyoo
    Vlatko Stojanovski – Stoyan-ovski
    Aleksandar Trajkovski – Try-kovski
    Ivan Trickovski – Tritch-kovski

    POLAND

    Polish is a much softer-sounding language than all the ‘k’s and ‘z’s would suggest. A ‘Ł’ or ‘ł’ is rather like an English ‘w’, while the subscript accent on an ‘ę’ or an ‘ą’ subtly adds an ‘n’ to the vowel.

    Bartosz Bereszyński – Berresh-in-skee
    Paweł Dawidowicz – Dav-id-ov-itch
    Łukasz Fabiański – Woo-cash Fab-yan-ski
    Kamil Jóźwiak – Yoz-vee-ak
    Tomasz Kędziora – Kend-zyor-a
    Dawid Kownacki – Kov-nats-kee
    Kacper Kozłowski – Kos-lov-skee
    Robert Lewandowski – Lev-and-ov-ski
    Kamil Piątkowski – Pyont-kov-skee
    Przemysław Płacheta – Pwa-shetta
    Tymoteusz Puchacz – Pook-atch
    Jakub Świerczok – Shfair-chock
    Wojciech Szczęsny – Voy-chekh Sh-chen-sni

    PORTUGAL

    Contrary to what most English speakers imagine, Portuguese sounds very different to Spanish. The ‘r’ at the start of Rui or Renato is a little bit like a rolled ‘r’ in French. The second vowels in ‘Lopes’ and ‘Neves’ get squashed down into a ‘sh’ – e.g. Lopsh, Nevsh.

    Anthony Lopes – Lopsh
    Bruno Fernandes – Fur-nandsh
    Diogo Jota – Dee-ohg Zhotta
    Gonçalo Guedes – Gon-sarlo Gair-diss
    Raphael Guerreiro – Ge-ray-ro
    João Félix – Joo-wow Fay-lix
    João Moutinho – Joo-wow Mo-teen-oo
    João Palhinha – Joo-wow Pal-een-a
    Pedro Gonçalves – Gon-salvsh
    Pepe – Pep (not ‘Pep-eh’)
    Rúben Neves – Nevsh

    RUSSIA

    Vowel sounds and the way they are stressed present the biggest challenges for English speakers, with common first names often not sounding exactly like their transcribed equivalents – hence Igor = Igar, Roman = Raman, Denis = Dinis, Oleg = Aleg.

    Igor Diveev – Div-ay-ev
    Artem Dzyuba – Jooba

    SCOTLAND

    Most native English speakers will be on safe ground.

    Jon McLaughlin – Mick-lock-lin
    Kieran Tierney – Teer-ni

    SLOVAKIA

    Rules similar to Czech: an ‘š’ is a ‘sh’, a ‘č’ is a ‘ch’, but a ‘c’ is more like a ‘ts’. Meanwhile, ‘Ď’ – with its superscript accent – sounds something like the ‘dg’ in ‘hedge’.

    Michal Ďuriš – Djoo-rish
    Marek Hamšík – Ham-sheek
    Patrik Hrošovský – Hroshov-skee
    Tomáš Hubočan – Hoo-bo-chan
    Dušan Kuciak – Koo-tsee-ack
    Juraj Kucka – Koots-ka
    Milan Škriniar – Shkrin-ee-ar
    Dávid Strelec – Strell-ets

    SPAIN

    Getting it right is tough for the uninitiated, but the following pronunciations may get you a bit closer. César Azpilicueta’s Chelsea team-mates famously nicknamed him ‘Dave’ to avoid the difficulty of saying his surname.

    César Azpilicueta – Ath-pili-coo-et-a
    Sergio Busquets – Boo-skets
    David de Gea – De-hay-eh
    Diego and Marcos Llorente – Lorentay

    SWEDEN

    That ‘g’ at the end of surnames sounds a lot like an English ‘y’; the ‘j’ also sounds like a ‘y’, while the first ‘o’ in many surnames is pronounced more akin to a ‘u’. Where there’s an ‘rs’ combo, it is an English ‘sh’.

    Marcus Berg – Berry
    Emil Forsberg – Fosh-berry
    Sebastian Larsson – La-shon
    Victor Lindelöf – Lin-de-love
    Robin Olsen – Ul-sen
    Mattias Svanberg – Svan-berry

    SWITZERLAND

    In addition to Switzerland’s mix of native languages – French, Swiss German and Italian – the prominence of players with Albanian, Kosovar and Turkish roots makes things even more exciting.

    Eray Cömert – Jo-mert
    Breel Embolo – Brail
    Becir Omeragic – Bess-eer Omer-adjitch
    Fabian Schär – Share
    Xherdan Shaqiri – Jer-dan Sha-chee-ree
    Granit Xhaka – Jakka

    TURKEY

    Umlauts do a similar job as in the Germanic languages, making an ‘ş’ a little like an English ‘sh’ and a ‘c’ more like a ‘j’. The problem characters are the ‘ğ’ and the dotless ‘ı’ – both of which are very subtle sounds.

    Kerem Aktürkoğlu – Actur-koch-loo
    Altay Bayındır – Baynder
    Uğurcan Çakır – Ooroojan Chak-r
    Hakan Çalhanoğlu – Chalha-no-loo
    Zeki Çelik – Cheleek
    Halil İbrahim Dervişoğlu – Darvish-oh-loo
    İrfan Can Kahveci – Car-vay-jee
    Efecan Karaca – Efferjan Karaja
    Orkun Kökçü – Kerk-choo
    Çağlar Söyüncü – Cha-la Ser-yoon-choo
    Yusuf Yazıcı – Yaz-idger

    UKRAINE

    Transcribed – like Russian – from the Cyrillic alphabet, Ukrainian is notably easier to pronounce. Names largely sound like they look in print. The number of ‘y’s might throw some English speakers, so it’s worth noting that they can generally be treated as English ‘i’s. An ‘iy’ is approximately the same as an English ‘ee’ – hence ‘Andriy’ = ‘Und-ree’.

    Heorhii Sudakov – Georgie
    Viktor Tsygankov – Zee-gan-kov

    WALES

    Mostly straightforward, but just in case …

    Chris Mepham – Mepp-um

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