What? Analytics is not a sideshow, it allows them to have clear and essential first-hand data on the popularity of sites, which is then likely used (with other factors) to drive Adsense auctions - their bread & butter.
If it were a free service "for the hell of it", Analytics would have long been discontinued.
By sideshow, OP was charitably going along with what Google’s EU lawyers would have us believe, not the reality on the ground. Of course it’s necessary for their ad business model as currently implemented. They would have to setup a separate ad auction unit in EU for EU visitors, if the ruling stands.
This reminds me of how IBM and Coca-Cola setup “independent” operations in Germany during the WWII embargo to provide products and services to the Nazi regime. Those units were later folded back into their original parent companies after the war, profits and all. That’s where Fanta came from. That’s what Coca-Cola Germany was called. I forget what the IBM one went by.
If it were a free service "for the hell of it", Analytics would have long been discontinued.