Euro 2012: These are the Apps for that

Every 4 years, the great soccer nations of Europe come together to vie to be the best in Europe.  Seeing that the continent houses ?most? of the great soccer countries; it?s a big deal.  Like the World Cup ? without the South American Giants (Brazil, Argentina etc. etc.), I am drawn to the pomp and color of the tournament.

The tournament is played within a month and the fact that all matches start at midnight (my time) means that I need to be up to date on the fixtures, scores, and news to keep up with the action.  Here are 2 apps I use to get my fix of Euro 2012 action.

UEFA Euro 2012 App

This is the official App made by the ruling body that runs Euro 2012.  It provides most of the information like:

• Team line-ups
• Fixtures
• Scores
• Group standings.
• Player biographies
• News Stories

There is also a video center and photos from the tournament along with a host city guide with a map of the Ukraine.  This is a basic app and generally chugs along providing you meaningful information.  It is not a standout app unlike the IRB Rugby World Cup App.

UEFA Euro 2012 App is available on iTunes App Store (free).

Euro 2012 by Livescore.com

I have always had livescore.com?s app on my phone to keep up with match scores.  Their app for the Euro 2012 proved just as good.

FEATURES
- Euro 2012 live scores and live group tables
- Detailed match information, including statistics and team sheets
- Euro 2012 news
- Stadiums information
- User friendly
- Time & Date localized
- Retina display support (high resolution graphics)
- iPad support
- Very fast and responsive
- Minimal data transfers
- Bandwidth friendly
- Lightweight
- Free

Navigating the app is easy with the landing on the current/last game played.  Swipe left and right to view the previous days or next days games.

Stages

In the Stages page, you get to see how each team is faring point-wise in their respective groups.  You also get to see how they performed during the qualifiers all the way to the knockout phase.  This is an invaluable resource for gauging the form and potential of the team.

Teams

In Teams stage, you can track the progress of any specific team.  This page also how you the team profile with players and managers names.

Finally, there is a News section to keep you current on what is happening.

Its not feature rich but this app is intuitive.  A testament to that is the fact that it was downloaded by 250,000 users and generated 15 million page views during the first 3 days of the tournament.

This app could be better with a Videos segment, but I guess we cannot have it all.

Euro 2012 by Livescore.com is available on the App Store (Free)