London to host EURO 2020 final

   

London's Wembley Stadium will host the final and semi-finals of the 2020 UEFA European Championship, which will exceptionally be held in 13 different countries, UEFA have announced.

The quarter-finals will meanwhile be hosted by Munich (Germany), Baku (Azerbaijan), Saint Petersburg (Russia) and Rome (Italy), the president of European football's governing body revealed at a ceremony in Geneva, Switzerland.  London beat its sole rival Munich for the top bid. 

For the 60th anniversary of the European Championship, first held in 1960, UEFA decided to organise the tournament across the whole continent. In all, 19 countries bid for a chance to host UEFA EURO 2020 games.

On top of one quarter-final, Rome, Munich, Baku and St Petersburg will each host three group stage games. Only hosts that had stadia with a capacity of 60,000 were considered.

Copenhagen (Denmark), Bucharest (Romania), Amsterdam (Netherlands), Dublin (Ireland), Bilbao (Spain), Budapest (Hungary), Brussels (Belgium) and Glasgow (Scotland), meanwhile, will each host one last-16 game and three group stage fixtures.

London, Munich, Rome, Brussels or Glasgow are experienced hosts of major sporting events, having already hosted FIFA World Cup™, EURO or Champions League games. But this is the first time cities like Baku, Budapest or Bucharest will host a major tournament. The stadiums in Budapest and Baku are still awaiting construction.

For this jubilee tournament, UEFA said it wanted a 'EURO for Europe'. "This is a historic moment because we'll be able to bring this competition to all the countries of Europe and especially to countries that would never otherwise have the chance to host such a competition," Platini said as he announced the winning bids. 

In the past, a single country - or at the most two, like Austria and Switzerland in 2008, or Poland and Ukraine in 2012 - hosted the finals. The experiment, which was Platini's brainchild, will be a one-off event however, with the 2024 tournament to be hosted again by a single country.

Minsk (Belarus), Sofia (Bulgaria), Cardiff (Wales), Skopje (Macedonia), Jerusalem (Israel) and Stockholm (Sweden) came away empty-handed. 

Football Association chairman Greg Dyke said: "We are delighted. Wembley is a great stadium and we are delighted to be holding the finals of this tournament. Wembley has been completely rebuilt since 1996 and is it a wonderful stadium."

Dyke also praised UEFA for the idea of hosting the tournament across 13 cities in Europe. He added: "It struck me what a good idea this is - look at all these capital cities hosting."