Bid Regulations for UEFA EURO 2016 approved
Meeting at the House of European Football, in Nyon, Switzerland, and chaired by UEFA President Michel Platini, the UEFA Executive Committee concluded its last gathering of 2008 and approved the official Bid Regulations for the UEFA European Football Championship 2014-16. UEFA EURO 2016™ will be the first European Football Championship final tournament to be held with 24 teams and the Bid Regulations document splits the bidding procedure into three clear phases.
First, there is an initiating phase launched on 15 December 2008, where any member association interested in bidding must signal their interest to UEFA by 9 March 2009, and after this point UEFA may decide to create a short list of three to four candidates.
Second, there is a bid dossier development phase, where UEFA will distribute the tournament requirements and the bid dossier template, and which must be completed and returned to UEFA by 15 February 2010.
Third, there is an evaluation phase, where UEFA will conduct a series of official visits to the various bidders as from March 2010. The UEFA administration, and experts appointed by UEFA, will then examine the bid dossiers and prepare a written evaluation report on each before passing these to the National Team Competition Committee, and before a final decision is taken by the UEFA Executive Committee on or about 27 May 2010.
Under the Bid Regulations joint bids of two member associations are permitted, and under exceptional circumstances, joint bids comprised of three member associations may be considered.
The Executive Committee also approved the appointment of Denmark as host of the UEFA European Under-21 Championship 2011.
A change of format and name for the UEFA Women’s Cup 2009/10 was also approved. The competition will be re-named the UEFA Women’s Champions League and the final will change from a two-legged match to a one-off game. It will take place in the same city, but in a different stadium, and be played on the Thursday prior to the UEFA Champions League Final, which as of the season 2009- 10 will now be played on a Saturday night. Format-wise the competition will have only one qualifying round of mini-tournaments and will be followed by knock-out rounds of 32 and 16 teams, then quarterand semi-finals leading up to the one-match final showcase.
The hosting of the UEFA Futsal Cup final four, to determine the eventual winner for the 2008/09 edition, was awarded to Ekaterinburg in Russia.
The Executive Committee were given the initial feedback from the refereeing experiment with five officials, conducted recently at the qualifying mini-tournaments in Hungary, Slovenia and Cyprus for the UEFA European Under-19 tournament. The experiment was seen as very positive and FIFA will now prepare a report to be presented to the International F.A. Board at the next Annual General Meeting in Northern Ireland on 27 February/01 March 2009.
The Executive Committee also took note that the goodwill financial compensation, offered by UEFA regarding the loss of signal during Match 29 of the recent UEFA EURO 2008™, has been welcomed and accepted by the broadcast partners. Finally, the hosting of the UEFA Congress 2010 was awarded to Israel.
The next meeting of the UEFA Executive Committee will be 29/30 January 2009 in Nyon.