UEFA President Aleksander Ceferin has labelled the EURO 2020 multi-country format unfair and has ruled out supporting another tournament to be hosted similarly in the future.
Aleksander Ceferin Is Against Repeating EURO 2020 Format
UEFA Boss Says the Format Is ‘Unfair’ Due to Travel Inequalities
The leader of European football’s governing body has labelled the format “an interesting idea” but conceded that it is “hard to implement”. The European Championships have been hosted by 11 different countries after the 12th host (The Aviva Stadium in Ireland) dropped out due to COVID-19 restrictions. The pan-European tournament has seen several countries play most of their fixtures at home, which has been outlined as an advantage by Ceferin.
The format has created a debate among fans and left many wondering if future European Championships will be hosted similarly. Ceferin has come out to cast doubt over a repeat of the idea, saying to BBC Sport: “I would not support it anymore. In a way, it is not correct that some teams have to travel more than 10,000km while others have to only travel 1,000km.
“It is not fair to fans, who had to be in Rome one day and in Baku over the next few, which is a four and a half hour flight. We had to travel a lot, into countries with different jurisdictions, different currencies, countries in the European Union (EU) and Non-EU, so it was not easy. It was a format that was decided before I came [into post] and I respect it. It is an interesting idea but it is hard to implement and I don’t think we will do it again.”
EURO 2024 will be hosted by Germany in a return to the single country format. No decision has been made about tournaments beyond that, but UEFA appears unlikely to allow another tournament to be done on such a large scale beyond this summer.
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