Georgian Football Federation filled an application for hosting European championship 2020 and sent it to UEFA. On Tuesday, Lado Vardzelashvili Minister of Sport and Youth Affairs and Domenti Sichinava President of GFF announced it at the press-conference, which was held in Ministry of Sports and Youth Affairs.
GFF sent the application to UEFA General Secretary Jany Infantino at 19:00 o’clock (Tbilisi time). If UEFA interests in Georgia’s application, in such case at the second stage Georgian side has to fill 30-page application, where are written all rrequirments of UEFA in details. Besides all details, at the second stage it is necessary to create logo and slogan for EURO-2020.
As it was known, Georgia and Azerbaijan were going to make application jointly, but Baku wants to hosts Olympic Games 2020 and that’s why Azerbaijan refused to hosting European championship 2020. As a result, Georgia has to fight for getting right of hosting this tournament alone.
For hosting European championship, country has to have minimum two stadiums, which are for 50 000 spectators- for opening ceremony and for final match. Minimum three stadiums are necessary for hosting quarter-final of semi-final matches, which are for 40 000 spectators and for hosting group stage is necessary to have arena minimum for 3 30000 people. Besides these, three reserve stadiums and high-class training bases are demanded. Minimum 350 journalists have to have seats in press-boxes at the stadium. Host country has to have two air-ports – one main and another reserve. The air-port can be able to receive 100 flights a day. Stadium must not be located farther than 75-minute travel from the city. Public transport must work in 24-hour regime. All over the country, there must be 9000 hotel rooms for hosting coaches and UEFA delegation. Besides these, 100 apartments are demanded for hosting high-rank guests. It is demanded to make fan-zones, minimum for 1000 fans. It is not complete lists of UEFA demands, which was introduced to “World Sport” by Tatia Burduli deputy of Domenti Sichinava. She had football management courses at UEFA and awarded with license. So, she knows UEFA requirements very well.
According to Vadzelashvili, besides Tbilisi, Kutaisi, Batumi, Gori and Zugdidi are considered as host countries of the tournament. As he stated, Georgia made a very important decision, because it will help to increase development of football and tourism infrastructure. To tell in a short way, minister’s inspiration was the following- if we do not get right of hosting championship, we should develop football infrastructure in any case. He hopes that UEFA will give chance to Georgia to go through the second and the third stage too. It is worth mentioning that May 15 was deadline of making application. Istanbul wants to host Olympic Games 2020 and if it cannot manage it, Michael Platini President of UEFA will support Turkey to host Euro-2020. By the way, Germany refused from making application of hosting this following tournament. The authority of Germany stated that now it is time another country to host this tournament.
Host country of European championship 2020 will found out at the end of 2013 or at the beginning of 2014.
Lasha Tabagari
