Celtic nations’ 2020 vision

Scotland, Wales and the Republic of Ireland have formally declared an interest in jointly hosting Euro 2020, as the celtic nations scent a chance to challenge Turkey.

The European championship ranks behind only the World Cup and the Olympics as a major sporting spectacle but interest in the 2020 tournament has been strangely muted.

Until this week, only Turkey had come forward and the prospect of a straight vote against that bid alone has prompted the national associations of Scotland, Wales and Ireland to take a first significant step towards submitting a bid of their own.

The three FAS have declared an interest in trihosting the tournament and Uefa’s deadline for such expressions of interest expired yesterday.

The only other country to

“Interest in the 2020 tournament has been strangely muted”

havecomeforward is Georgia, but the former Soviet republic would struggle to satisfy Uefa’s criteria on the number and quality of stadiums, especially as the tournament will expand from 16 to 24 teams in four years.

Turkey at one point looked nailed on to become hosts after being publicly supported by Uefa presidentmichel Platini but that bid is nowinsomedisarray. The Turkish federation has been engulfed by allegations of corruption and match-fixing in Turkish football and a Euro 2020 bid conflicts with Istanbul’s bid to land the Olympics in the same year.

Platini had signalled he would support Turkey’s bid, but only if Istanbul failed in its Olympic bid.

Uefa executive committee members much prefer being able to choose between more than one candidate and having a rival for Euro 2020 also gets the IOC out of a hole because it could not vote for Istanbul if Turkey were the only Euro bidder.

A SFA spokesman said: “We have declared our interest to Uefa. Bids will not be required for at least 18 months.”