Poland has scored a big feat winning the bid for the 2012 European Football Championships (commonly referred as Euro 2012) together with Ukraine. Poland and Ukraine won the bid against Italy, the most serious contender, against Hungary and Croatia (which were eager to organize the event together) and against five other countries.
The UEFA decision in April 2007 was enthusiastically welcomed in Poland and Ukraine. Even before the decision was announced, 73% of Poles surveyed (and 80% of Ukrainians) spoke out in favour of staging championships together in their respective countries.
In Poland, preparations for this event have started immediately and are gaining momentum as Euro 2012 is approaching. The challenge is big. The amount of preparatory work to be done is formidable. After all, the European football championships represent the world’s third largest sports event after the Olympic Games and the World Cup.
Poland and Ukraine have now asked the UEFA for permission to arrange the Euro 2012 event on twelve stadiums, six in Poland and six in Ukraine, rather than on only four in each country as was originally agreed when the decision on entrusting the organization of the championships to the two countries was taken. After all, the 2004 European Football Championships in Portugal, a country of 10 million people and with an area of less than 100,000 square kilometres, were played on ten stadiums in eight cities. If that was the case in Portugal, there is no reason why Euro 2012 could not be played in six cities each in Poland and Ukraine which have a joint population of 85 million and a territory of close to one million square kilometres. The four Polish cities where the matches will be played for sure as originally agreed are Warsaw, Gdańsk, Wrocław and Poznań. Appropriate preparations to stage the event in these cities are under way. The question remains still open whether – pending on UEFA’s agreement – matches would also be played in two more places. The contenders are Kraków and Chorzów. Both cities are eager to play host and confident that they would do so. To this end, stadiums in both these cities are being modernized. Two additional stands are being built in Kraków, the sitting capacity is to be increased up to 50,000 and a canopy is to be built in Chorzów. UEFA’ s decision on whether they would be added to the list and qualify will be made in autumn 2009.
The primary issue connected with stadiums is to ensure that all sports arenas where international and interstate matches will be played comply with UEFFA standards coming into force as of 2012. These require that stadiums shall not have a smaller capacity than 30,000 seats during group matches, not less than 40,000 during quarter and semi finals and not less than 50,000 during finals. At the moment only the Śląski Stadium in Chorzów meets the new standards.
Effective measures have also to be taken to secure safety of the athletes and spectators. That is a matter of key importance in the present-day world. This adds to the enormous work that has to be done in preparation for Euro 2012.
Apart from sports stadiums, hotels and training centres have to be developed for the players, instructors, and the media covering the events. A list of one hundred such centres has already been submitted to our group. More are to be established before the UEFA delegation visits Poland in autumn 2010 to check the state of Poland’s preparedness for the big event.
Apart from building, modernizing and developing sports facilities proper, a lot of other work has to be done. For one, adequate faci-
lities have to be developed in preparation for the thousands of sports fans that will arrive to the respective cities to watch the football matches. It is common knowledge that the number of sports fans coming to places where matches are played is bigger than the capacity of the respective stadiums. This presents a logistic problem that needs to be solved. Basically, the high influx of fans should not paralyze the daily life of the local inhabitants but at the same time proper accommodation and facilities have to be ensured for those who will be coming. That means the need to develop hospitality and catering services, among other things. A list of hotels has already been drawn, with particular stress on four and five-star hotels which UEFA mostly uses to accommodate the organizers and guests, sponsors, VIPs, that is the “UEFA Family”.
Preparations for Euro 2012 also include the development of roads, railway lines and airports, medical facilities and what have you.
An army of volunteers versed in foreign languages will have to be trained in the run up to Euro 2012 to cater for all those involved in this big sports event.
Naturally, Euro 2012 will be widely watched on television. Broadcasting rights for Poland have already been acquired from the UEFA by Polsat, a commercial TV network, which shall share the rights with public television. It may be presumed, however, that in view of the technological progress, reports from the matches will also be available on the Internet and perhaps in mobiles as well.
The entire documentation related to Poland’s preparations for Euro 2012 consists of three pages of documents, plans, graphs and enclosures already submitted to UEFA. The most important ones bear the signatures of Polish and Ukrainian prime ministers.
Naturally, Poland will do its best to meet the unique challenge of organising Euro 2012.