Ghost1 wrote:
Interesting, all Nordics (Scandinavians) seem to speak perfect English when they are interviewed by French TV but many athletes from countries in southern Europe seem to have very limited ability in English when it comes to being interviewed. I should also include countries like the Ukraine where many or most people have very limited English. By the way this is not a criticism but just an observation.
However, I think the top English speakers in Europe are the Dutch. Most of those guys and girls (in the Netherlands ) could almost be classified as “native speakers” such is their proficiency. Strangely, Germans, their neighbors, have a lower ability in English and some Germans are actually quite deficient in the language of Shakespeare. Again these are not criticisms just observations from my travels.
There are far more German, Italian and Spanish speakers than Dutch, Finn, Swedish or Norwegian speakers. When there aren't many people who speak the primary language of your country, your government devotes a lot of time and resource on the foreign language education.
Reverse is true. The governments in English speaking countries usually don't spend much time and resources in foreign language education. Why learn a second language when everyone else tries to learn your first language?