Poland and Ukraine pip Italy for Euro 2012

POLAND and Ukraine will host the European Championship finals in 2012 after UEFA surprisingly awarded them the tournament ahead of Italy and another joint bid from Hungary and Croatia yesterday.

Despite the Italian game being blighted by match fixing and crowd violence in the last year, Italy were favourites to be awarded the finals for the third time in their history.

Instead, UEFA has gambled by awarding the second largest football tournament in the world to two countries who have never previously hosted anything of this magnitude.

Earlier, their bid appeared to have been undermined on two fronts. FIFA had threatened to ban Poland from international competition after its government removed the country's football association from power in January following a scandal involving corrupt referees.

And the unstable political climate in Ukraine, with a presidential decree having dissolved parliament and called for a new election next month, had also raised doubts.

Italian delegates at Cardiff's City Hall, where UEFA president Michel Platini announced the decision, were stunned while the Polish and Ukrainian officials leapt and hugged each other in rapturous delight.

"There are 85 million people now waiting for this big football event," Polish FA chairman Michal Listkiewicz said.

"The friendship between our nations has a very long history. This big tournament will be an important milestone in the history of our two Slavic nations."

Hryhory Surkis, the president of the Ukraine FA, said: "This is the greatest result in the history of our football."

The 12 eligible voting UEFA executive committee members gave eight votes to Poland and Ukraine, four to Italy and none to Hungary and Croatia.

"I'm not surprised this has happened," the president of the Italian Football League, Antonio Matarrese, told Italy's La7 television station.

Aljosa Asanovic, a former Croatia player and assistant to the national team coach, told Croatian news agency Hina: "It's difficult to say what caused this decision, but one should bear in mind that Hryhory Surkis is a member of the UEFA executive board. He could not vote, but probably had a considerable influence on the final decision."

While the Italians, Croats and Hungarians were licking their wounds, the Poles and Ukrainians were overjoyed.

Ukrainian government ministers broke into applause as the announcement was made during a cabinet meeting while the Warsaw stock exchange reacted by reaching a record high.

"It's a beautiful day for Polish sport," Prime Minister Jaroslaw Kaczynski told reporters in Brussels as he met with European Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso.

Sergei Bubka, the former world and Olympic pole vault champion and now president of the Ukraine Olympic Committee and an IOC member added: "This is a remarkable achievement for our country. It is an astonishing success."

Ukraine's First Deputy Prime Minister Mykola Azarov said the government would within ten days draw up a programme to prepare for the championship.

"In terms of the economy, Ukraine will come out a winner. It will provide a serious boost for developing our infrastructure and tourism," Azarov told a briefing afterwards.

"What's important is that we will have not only Ukrainian resources working on this, but also foreign investors."

Poland's former president, Solidarity leader and Nobel Peace Prize winner Lech Walesa also acclaimed the result.

"I'm extremely happy. I was personally involved in trying to help Poland and Ukraine organise the Euro tournament. I've put my authority at stake and I admit that I gave a 50-50 chance of Poland winning," said Walesa.

Leo Beenhakker, the Dutch coach of the Polish national team praised the decision, saying: "Michel Platini has said it was time to change and UEFA have done that.

"I am delighted for the two countries. It would have been too easy to give it to Italy."

Four Ukrainian cities and six Polish venues have been lined up as host cities for 2012.

The four Ukrainian venues are Dnipropetrovsk, Donetsk, Kiev and Lviv while Gdansk, Krakow, Poznan, Warsaw, Wroclaw, Chorzow have been earmarked for games in Poland, although this may be cut to four cities.

UEFA sources likened the final Italian presentation to that of Paris made to the IOC in Singapore in 2006 when London were surprisingly awarded the 2012 Olympics.

"The Italian presentation was rather safe and a little unemotional while the Polish/Ukraine bid was passionate," the source said.

"The fact the two presidents of the countries: Viktor Yushchenko of Ukraine and Lech Kaczynski of Poland were here in person to help the bid made a huge impression."

• POLAND and Ukraine have strong footballing traditions, with Ukraine having reached the quarter-finals of the last World Cup in their first appearance since seceding from the Soviet Union. Poland were eliminated at the group stage but finished third in the 1974 and 1982 World Cups as well as winning the 1972 Olympic title.

HOST CITIES

Eight cities, four in each country, are being proposed. The four Ukrainian venues are Dnipropetrovsk, Donetsk, Kiev and Lviv while Gdansk, Poznan, Warsaw and Wroclaw have been earmarked for games in Poland, with Krakow and Chorzow in reserve.

PROS

There have been signs of a move against the powerful western nations in UEFA politics recently and the victory of Michel Platini, while a Frenchman, in the presidential elections was seen as a sign that less powerful national federations are challenging the established order. Despite this, the Poland/Ukraine victory over favourites Italy was a major surprise. Choosing two former members of the Communist bloc to stage the continent's biggest football tournament will be seen as a victory for many other of the former member states of the Warsaw Pact.

CONS

The infrastructure of both countries will need to be upgraded and the economies of both former Communist-ruled countries remains fragile, with many young people having left the country to work elsewhere, usually in Western Europe. The political situation in the Ukraine has been unstable since the Orange Revolution of 2004-5.

FOOTBALLING ICONS

Andriy Shevchenko may be the most famous Ukrainian footballing face in the west but national team coach Oleg Blokhin, who won the Ballon d'Or as a player in 1975, is perhaps still the all-time symbol of Ukrainian football. Zbigniew Boniek remains the most famous Polish footballing name.

TEN FACTS ABOUT HOSTS

• Populations: Poland 38,536,869, Ukraine 46,710,816.

• Ukraine is two hours ahead of British Summer Time - Poland is one.

• Poland's agricultural produce is potatoes, fruits, vegetables, wheat, poultry, eggs, pork and dairy. Ukraine produces grain, sugar beets, vegetables; beef and milk.

• The Zloty is Poland's currency; Ukraine's is the Hryvnia.

• Current exchange rates are 5.6 zlotych and 10 Hryvnia to the pound.

• Poland's national team are ranked 21st in the new FIFA list; Ukraine are 11th.

• Celtic pair Artur Boruc and Maciej Zurawski are Polish internationalists.

• Poland is a predominantly Roman Catholic country while Ukraine is Orthodox..

• Chelsea striker Andriy Shevchenko, and boxing brothers Vitali and Wladimir Klitschko, are Ukraine's sporting superstars.

• Oscar-winning film director Roman Polanski, born in France, is Polish.