Corazon de Leon wrote:Grumpy David wrote:Corazon de Leon wrote:Hosting the Euros would be offensively stupid. Ridiculous suggestion.
What's the alternative for UEFA? Keep it spread out all over Europe? With fans (what percentage of the tickets have to be held back to deal with social distancing) / without fans? With tickets only available to people living in the host country? Cancel it?
I have no doubt that UEFA are doing Continuity Planning for it and if we can continue vaccinating at the current rate (and likely ramp up as the Modena, Novavax and Johnson & Johnson vaccines become available) then the UK does become a viable option if UEFA decide they'd like to try a somewhat normal event. And it being outdoors in June and July does make it lower risk than something like an indoor concert.
The target of all adults to have been offered a 1st dose by 31st July seems very easy. If this target is actually reached 3 weeks before the start of the Euros would you have a different view?
No, I wouldn't (and my understanding is that Euro 2020 is scheduled to begin on 11 June, way before the 31 July deadline). It is genuine madness to hold an international football tournament(or indoor concert, or open-air concert for that matter) in the UK this year before we have time to fully vaccinate the majority of the population with both of the required doses. I'm all for letting fans back into stadiums as soon as possible, but not before we can be absolutely sure there are no major risks, and certainly not in large numbers at first.
There are so many questions that we don't take into account as well - this is an international tournament, and that throws up a whole load of problems. The UK is only scheduled to host seven or eight games of Euro 2020(off the top of my head), ramping that up would require a massive effort in a short amount of time. Given that the government, and presumably the FA, are looking for fans to be in stadiums, whose fans will be allowed in? Are we going to allow limited numbers(or unlimited numbers) of foreign fans to travel from quite far afield to support their respective countries?
How do we police all of that, given that different countries will have different rates of vaccination? Do we not do that, but let England/Scotland/Wales supporters travel around the country to support their team(or, for example, if I win a ticket to Wembley in the ballot, can I attend it given that I live in Scotland?)? If we decide not to allow foreign fans into the country, how are tickets allocated out, where are matches played, etc? Do the countries that aren't England, Scotland and Wales accept that those three teams will have a massive home-field advantage while the other 21 have no support?
FWIW, the government have officially quashed the Euros rumour regardless. Though I wouldn't necessarily take Matt Hancock's word for that.
https://www.independent.co.uk/sport/football/matt-hancock-euro-2020-england-wembley-b1805271.htmlEDIT: Should be clear here that I'm objecting to the tournament being held here with fans in the stadiums, not the tournament being held here behind closed doors.
Don't know why I thought it started closer to the end of June rather than the start!
I still think 31st July is way too easy as a target based on current vaccination rates which are likely to get faster (and especially if Johnson & Johnson gets approved as it's a 1 dose vaccine) so my thinking is that essentially every adult who wants a vaccine will have had at least a single dose by that stage.
And a large amount of games will take place from 21st June onwards which sounds like we may have more or less finished social distancing since even night clubs will be allowed to reopen. Before then up to 10,000 are allowed.
The TIFO video on the previous page deals with what other European countries could take on the logistics of a last minute change and the 2 obvious options of France and Germany having recently hosted it and will host the next one means neither shows much enthusiasm for this particular one.
The home advantage issue is a non issue for Wales and Scotland but not an unsolvable issue for England.
Agreed that Hancock saying its not happened means it's probably more likely that it will happen.
