The England national football team has reached the final of the European football tournament after 55 years. The team will play against Italy to lift the Euro Cup. England fans have waited 55 years to see their team reach a major international tournament final, and UEFA president Aleksander Ceferin has decided to rain on their parade just days after they did.
With matches being held in 11 different cities throughout Europe, resulting in some teams having to travel significantly more than others, this summer’s tournament saw UEFA experiment with a new format.
In the quarter-final against Ukraine in Rome, finalists England has only had to play a game away from Wembley once, and now that the Three Lions have finally discovered a means to succeed at major events, UEFA president Ceferin has vowed that it will never happen again.
“I would not support it [the format] anymore,” he told BBC Sport. “In a way, it is not correct that some teams have to travel more than 10,000km while others have to only travel 1000km. It is not fair to fans, who had to be in Rome one day and in Baku over the next few, which is a four and a half hour flight.
“We had to travel a lot, into countries with different jurisdictions, different currencies, countries in the European Union [EU] and Non-EU, so it was not easy. It was a format that was decided before I came [into post] and I respect it. It is an interesting idea but it is hard to implement and I don’t think we will do it again.”
