Euro 2020....

[No Fixed Abode]

http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/football/20631963

To be held across the continent instead of one/two Countries hosting it........

[cmonurz]

Agreed, massive at this.

[REMTARDROYAL]

It could work

It probably won't

[Super_horns]

More money for the suits then but its tough on the fans and teams in terms of travelling.

[Stranded]

It could work but is pretty flawed.

They could name 12 cities across Europe and have each of the 6 groups play over two relatively close cities to minimise movement during the groups so for example:

Group A: London & Cardiff
B: Paris & Amsterdam
C: Madrid & Lisbon
D: Munich & Milan
E: Prague & Vienna
F: Oslo & Stockhom

Then teams can move around for the knockout round a bit more.

The flaw is they would have to seed the draw even more to ensure to make it worth while, for example there's no point having England qualify and play in Group D whilst Group A has Greece, Switzerland, Finland & Ukraine.

[REMTARDROYAL]

or they choose the cities to fit the draw?

[Rev Algenon Stickleback H]

or they choose the cities to fit the draw?

So if England draw Italy, who gets to play at home?

[Royalist]

Can see it being a huge success. Will be easier for millions of people to even think about going to a game if done right. Pan European ticket prices would be nice but i doubt that will happen!

[soggy biscuit]

I don't see it as such a bad idea at all as long as it is mostly shared between the kinds of places that would not usually get a chance at it.

If it is spread across Europe and places like London, Paris, Munich etc get it then it will be pointless.

[soggy biscuit]

Then again, I am one of the few that thinks the WC in Qatar is good (don't believe the Daily Mail horror stories of what it will be like)

[paultheroyal]

I don't see it as such a bad idea at all as long as it is mostly shared between the kinds of places that would not usually get a chance at it.

If it is spread across Europe and places like London, Paris, Munich etc get it then it will be pointless.

That would be a better idea.

Great to host matches in Finland, Hungary and the like.

[Optimist]

As EUROs from now on will have 24 teams, the format will be the same as World Cups 86-94, therefore there will be 52 matches played.

Currently there are 53 full members of UEFA, and there will be a vote next year to see if Gibraltar (the only provisional member) can be given full status. Also by 2020 the political map may have changed and there could be one or two more countries in Europe (Abhkazia or Kosovo maybe?). So you could have one game in each country, except a couple who won't have a big enough ground (San Marino, Liechtenstein, Andorra maybe?), which imo would be great, but then that also creates a problem; could you really only give one game to either Madrid/Barcelona, or Rome/Turin/Milan?

[Kitsondinho]

It is a bollox idea that is only designed to make UEFA extra money....just like the expansion of the CL to 300 teams and 4 fighting bears. Imagine England get group games in Porto, Moscow and Tromso....It will not work on any level. The only way they can possible do it is as Stranded suggested, with even more ridiculous seeding....which will just make the whole thing a joke! They may as well do away with European club football and have a PES style international league.

[TBM]

Do the hosts get auto qualification?

[soggy biscuit]

Turkey, Serbia, Wales, Sweden, Scotland & Romania have some of the biggest football stadiums in Europe but stand little chance of hosting their own full tournament. Add to that countries/Cities with other large sports stadiums that could be converted (Ireland?) and some other countries with 30,000 - 40,000 capacity stadiums (Denmark, Greece etc) and i think you could have yourself a pretty good tournament

[REMTARDROYAL]

or they choose the cities to fit the draw?

So if England draw Italy, who gets to play at home?

Logically, neither but both could cope with being based in, say, Paris/Amsterdam.

[REMTARDROYAL]

Perfect sponsors would be easyjet

[Barry the bird boggler]

Hey what a good idea, how long before FIFA decide to have a 64 team World Cup Finals spread across the world..... (still nothing hosted in England of course).

[Alexander Litvinenko]

But they had no real bids for it - one from Turkey which wasn't suitable, but from other countries only "expressions of interest" which didn't turn into formal bids - like one from Wales & Scotland.

So this is expediency more than anything else, complicated by the expansion to 32 teams - and that's the real thing.

[Divvy]

I don't see it as such a bad idea at all as long as it is mostly shared between the kinds of places that would not usually get a chance at it.

If it is spread across Europe and places like London, Paris, Munich etc get it then it will be pointless.

That would be a better idea.

Great to host matches in Finland, Hungary and the like.

Agree, but in small unsuitable stadiums that wont bring in enough money? It wont happen.