Gavin Cooney

IRELAND IS SET to co-host the 2028 Uefa European Championships alongside the United Kingdom, with Uefa today confirming their bid to stage the tournament is unopposed. 

Turkey initially submitted a rival bid for the tournament but subsequently announced their intention to bid for the 2032 edition of the tournament, against Italy.

It then emerged earlier this year that Turkey and Italy would submit a joint bid for the 2032 tournament rather than compete against one another, and today Uefa announced that Turkey’s bid for 2028 has been withdrawn as a result. 

That leaves the Irish/UK bid for 2028 unopposed, with the final hurdle to clear being ratification by a vote at Uefa’s Executive Committee meeting in Switzerland next Tuesday. That is expected to be a formality. 

“Further to the announcement on 28 July which revealed the desire of the Italian and Turkish FAs to submit a joint bid to stage Uefa Euro 2032, the Uefa administration has today written to both associations to confirm that their joint bid has been duly received and will go forward for assessment and consideration by the Uefa Executive Committee”, read a statement.

“As indicated by the FA of Türkiye with its submission of the request for a joint bid, their bid to stage Uefa Euro 2028 is consequently withdrawn.

The award of both tournaments still requires the approval of the Executive Committee at its meeting in Nyon on 10 October.

The presentations at that meeting will be an important part of the process which will take due consideration of the content of the bid submissions before reaching a decision.” 

The Football Association of Ireland (FAI) responded with a statement to say they are confident Uefa will ratify their “compelling” bid for the tournament. 

“We are looking forward to presenting our bid to Uefa on 10th October”, said the FAI. “These are exciting times, and we have a very compelling Euro 2028 proposal for Uefa.

“Our bid is ground-breaking for the men’s European Championships and will deliver lasting legacies across the whole of Ireland and the UK.

“We will share full details of the bid in Nyon next week and are confident that Uefa will approve our candidacy to host Euro 2028.”  

Should that process be completed, games will be staged across Ireland, Northern Ireland, Scotland, Wales, and England.

The Aviva Stadium is the sole nominated venue for games in Ireland, while Casement Park is the sole nominated venue in Northern Ireland, as Windsor Park falls short of capacity requirements.

All parties involved have expressed confidence that the stadium will be redeveloped in time for the tournament. 

The other nominated venues are the Principality Stadium in Cardiff; Hampden Park in Glasgow; along with Villa Park (Birmingham), the Etihad Stadium (Manchester), Tottenham Hotspur Stadium (London), St James’ Park (Newcastle), the new Everton Stadium (Liverpool), and Wembley Stadium (London.) 

There is no confirmation yet on how many co-hosts will qualify automatically, though Uefa are highly unlikely to guarantee a spot for all five co-hosts.

While nothing has been announced on this front, it has been reported that the five sides will compete in the qualification campaign as normal, with slots then reserved for the two highest-ranked co-hosts who do not qualify via the traditional route. 

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