All of England's 3 group games -- Croatia- Czech-Rep- Winner Path C are to be held at Wembley. The Taffs play Switzerland in Baku Azerbaijan - Turkey in Baku - Italy in Rome. Why are group matches held in countries which haven't qualified for the next stage? Do countries like England who play matches 'at home' have an advantage?
Makes no sense to me . it seems that it's a Europe wide competition which in essense is fair enough. Maybe nobody wanted to host it because of costs .
Thanks MK - it's not particularly continent wide. Germany's 3 games played in Munich - Holland's 3 in Amsterdam - Spain's in Bilbao. No matches at all in Turkey Finland Switzerland Portugal Poland Ukralne Sweden. And there 3 games in Glasgow and Dublin.
Scotland hosting a tournament that they aren’t going to qualify for though is pi$$ funny you have to admit. I’d rather it be in one country and having a month off work, the potential planning for our games at the moment is a right ball ache, either Dublin or St Petersburg to book on a 2 or 3 day turn around. What is ridiculous is the ticket prices, ballet opens tomorrow for members, you’re looking at €195 for the semi final and €295 final tickets. That’s the cheapest! Working mans game and all that. For the cheapest ticket categories following England this tournament will cost. €765
Yeah it's not the entire continent of Europe but certainly covers a fair chunk of it. Azerbaijan Denmark England Germany Hungary Italy Netherlands Republic of Ireland Romania Russia Scotland Spain I'm glad it's only this tournament taking on this format.
I agree mate it’s ridiculous, we could end up in Azerbaijan If we finish 3rd. It really is a joke, UEFA found how unpopular and impractical that venue is for fans from the Europa league final but still decided it was fit for this tournament. Ridiculous. UEFA think they’re going fans a favour though by making tickets in that particular city €20 cheaper than the other cities. Disregarding the hundreds or possibly thousands of pounds it’s potentially going to cost fans to get there.
World Cup in South Africa World Cup in Russia World Cup in Qatar Do you really need to ask why there are games in Baku? (and yes I know it's a different Govening body, but the same principles apply.)
They were all FIFA tournaments though they could get away with selling to the public they’re trying to build the game in those countries, opposed to allegations or corruption. UEFA aren’t even hiding it by hosting a tournament in Baku, I mean it’s a European championship not in Europe!!
That’s the Platini spin. It was actually all about maximising profit by being able to play group games in big stadiums. I usually go to the Euros but won’t be next year.
That’s not the case. Belgium and Ukraine were top seeds and neither are playing at home. Each venue had to bid to stage games. Belgium originally were awarded games but had the right taken away due to delays building the stadium. Host venues were paired with Wembley and Hamden park selected as the grounds for group D. Interesting fact is if Scotland had qualified direct they would have been placed in the group with England and the venue for the game would have been decided by the toss of a coin. Because they didn’t as a host nation their play off is still for a place in group D but they would play 2 games at Hamden with England having the automatic hosting right for the game between the two.