CELTIC EURO 2008 BID KICKS OFF
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Scotland and Ireland's joint bid to stage the Euro 2008 football tournament will finally be handed over to UEFA on Wednesday.
Representatives from both countries will submit their finals plans to host the tournament to UEFA bosses at a meeting in Switzerland this afternoon.
Officials from both countries say they believe their bid stands "a great chance" of being picked.
Seven bids will be presented to UEFA at a special ceremony at the House of Football in Nyon.
Simon Lyons, marketing director for the Scotland and Ireland bid, said he and Scottish Football Association chief David Taylor and bid manager John Henderson were delighted to have the chance to discuss the merits of their proposal in person.
"This is a terrific chance for us to go into detail about this bid in front of UEFA officials and the media in Switzerland," Mr Lyons said.
"We are still very confident about it and believe it stands a great chance."
Mr Lyons said he believed Ireland's success in the World Cup coupled with the smooth-running of the Champions League final held in Glasgow last month would help the bid.
"We are pleased with the timing of this visit and will use every opportunity given to us to promote our bid," Mr Lyons said.
"This is not just a football tournament, it is about festival and fiesta and creating a carnival atmosphere.
"The Irish fans showed they are experts at that over in Japan and South Korea and the Scots demonstrated that at the Champions League final last month, but anyway both nations have a reputation as fun-loving football countries."
Only two of the seven bids are from single associations, the remaining are based on joint bids from between two and four countries.
Ireland and Scotland face competition from the joint bids of the Scandinavian countries, Turkey and Greece, Bosnia and Croatia, Switzerland and Austria and single bids from Hungary and Russia.
Mr Lyons said another positive factor about the Celtic bid was the fact it offered 1.7million seats at the eight stadia which would be used.
He added: "The media are saying that our nearest rival is the Scandinavian bid, and they can only offer 1.2million seats."
UEFA officials are due to visit all the prospective host countries in September and a decision will be made in December.
By Natalie Walker, PA News
www.sportinglife.com
My concerns about this bid
There's a few things I don't like about this bid:
firstly we're very much a tack-on to a Scottish bid for the tournament, the junior partners if you like. Don't get me wrong, its not Scotlands fault, its our own for having rubbish facilities. I'd much prefer a 50:50 split if we were to co-host the tournament (obviously not possible until we get some decent stadiums).
Secondly, all three stadiums put forward on this side are in Dublin, making this a Scotland-Dublin rather than a Scotland-Ireland bid. My main problem here is that they're proposing to rebuild lansdowne as the second stadium, presumably with government money. What is the point of this if Stadium ireland is being built? Lansdowne would never be used afterwards, better to spend the same money on a new stadium in one of the regions than waste it rebuilding Lansdowne Road which isn't needed. A stadium in Cork (for example) could be used more often than a rebuilt Lansdowne Road which is patently unnecessary, i.e. a couple of Rugby and football friendlies a year, big Munster games, even the GAA could use it since they wouldn't own the place it wouldn't conflict with their rules, and Pairc ui Chaoimh is a kip anyway.
And thirdly, the Scots want to use three stadiums in Glasgow (I think) Murrayfield, Ibrox and Celtic Park. Has this ever been done before? Three stadiums in the same city is asking for trouble because you'd have several groups based around there, which means loads of fans from different countries all mixing in the same city centre. I remember Paris had two stadiums in 1998 but Paris is a far bigger city than Glasgow, and they still only used two stadiums. Also, English hooligans haven't been a problem recently because the worst of them can be banned from travelling, since there's no border with Scotland there'd be no problem for these scumbags to get there (provided england qualify). That last point is englands problem not Scotlands though and shouldn't be used to knock the bid.
I know this sounds like a bit of a whinge-fest, but i think they're mostly valid points. I'd like to point out that I'm not against this bid at all, I'm just not an ardent supporter of it either. I'd like to know what others have to add to this.
Re: My concerns about this bid
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Originally posted by MikeW
Lansdowne would never be used afterwards
The IRFU would still use it for medium games: AIL finals, big Leinster ERC games, friendlies; pretty much everything they do now bar the 6 nations games. Any football friendlies would be there too, it hasn't been full for any of the WC warm-up games.
Personally I'd rather a 60k+ Lansdowne to the Bertie Bowl for location and history reasons.
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And thirdly, the Scots want to use three stadiums in Glasgow (I think) Murrayfield, Ibrox and Celtic Park.
Murrayfield is in Edinburgh but Hamden Park in Glasgow is also being used.
