Post by caspday on Dec 10, 2012 12:57:33 GMT 10
Euro 2016 will be my seventh European Tony Romo Jersey Championship. The confirmation that the following tournament will be staged in countries across the continent could make those finals in France my last, or at least the first such where I go home early rather than immersing myself for the duration. Plenty more fans, going to their first tournament or their 10th, are liable to take a similar view in 2020.Uefa's decision has some superficial attraction, not least Wholesale NFL Jerseys to those who fly from venue to venue, staying in five-star hotels that are booked and paid for by someone else. Yet it is not Michel Platini and his fellow executives who create the atmosphere around the tournament, but the mass of travelling supporters, far more liable to take Authentic Tony Romo Jersey an overnight train than head to the airport to move from match to match. If experience is anything to go by then Euro 2020 will diminish one of Uefa's most valuable properties, which is also a damn fine way to spend three and a half weeks every four years.Paris is a Wholesale Nike NFL Jerseys cosmopolitan city at any time but in the second and third weeks of June 2016, when it is at the heart of a 24-team tournament, it will take on a fresh spirit. The expansion from 16 teams has been widely criticised on the grounds that it will affect the quality of play, but the influx of extra qualifiers will create a richer mix off the pitch.The atmosphere around games was at the heart of the success of the last World Cup in Europe, when Germany Miles Austin Jersey 2006's invitation to come with or without a ticket was taken up by huge numbers. It is remarkable that first Fifa and now Uefa are turning their backs on a model that both praised so highly.We already see a hint of the problems to come in the existing knockout stages, when host cities empty even if they have matches still to stage. At a glance this may seem perverse but there is a limit to how much time people can take off work, so they book trips Wholesale Football Jerseys for when they know their team will be playing. Thousands from each qualifier head home after the group stages even if their team are not eliminated, looking regretfully over their shoulders.The effect can seem minimal; the margin from highest crowd to lowest attendance Best Miles Austin Jersey in Kiev last summer was only 1,400, even if the final had the second smallest attendance at the Olimpiyskiy. But suddenly spare tickets lose their rarity value and the market to sell them to shrinks; if you wanted to go to the final then you could, and I did.In 2020 Uefa will be reliant on locals suddenly having a taste for knockout games having not partaken of the jamboree, and the relatively small numbers able to pay inflated prices for fresh flights at every stage. I am lucky enough to be able to subsidise my trips by writing about them, but such people will not fill streets or stadiums.Elsewhere, we will lose Wholesale Sports Jerseys the sense of wonder at being the centre of continental if not global attention, which moved so many Poles and Ukrainians last summer, an experience the British shared a month later.Uefa claims that the burden of staging a 24-team final will be reduced by spreading it about. Gianni Infantino, the general secretary, said: "It will be a lot easier from a financial perspective for all the countries … the fact that the Euro moves to 24 teams bears additional burdens on the host nations, the requirements are becoming bigger and bigger."The 16-team Euro 2004 was a fantastic trip but Portugal's ambition exceeded its finances. New Dallas Cowboys Jerseys stadiums holding 30,000 could stage only two matches, and then be turned over to clubs that get crowds one tenth of that number, and the outlay looks more like expense than investment in light of BE1210ZYH the country's subsequent financial crisis. However, there are established countries cowboysnflonlinesale.com that could quite happily just put up some bunting and would not need Infantino's new "airports or 10 stadiums".One country with world-class grounds and a proven ability to stage international sporting events comes quickly to mind. If the FA has the bid book still on a computer disc then it could open it up, replace "2018 World Cup" with "Euro 2020", hit print and have a copy at Uefa's Swiss headquarters by close of business on Friday.