UEFA Euro 2008

UEFA Euro 2008
Fußball-Europameisterschaft 2008; Championnat d'Europe de football 2008; Campionato europeo di calcio 2008; Campiunadi d'Europa da ballape 2008
	File:UEFA EURO 2008 New Logo.svg UEFA Euro 2008 official logo
Tournament details
Host countries	Austria; Switzerland
Dates	7 June – 29 June
Teams	16
Venue(s)	8 (in 8 host cities)
Tournament statistics
Matches played	5
Goals scored	6 (1.2 per match)
Attendance	180,849 (36,170 per match)
Top scorer(s)	Lukas Podolski (2 goals)
	All statistics correct as of 19:23, 9 June 2008 (UTC).

The 2008 UEFA European Football Championship, commonly referred to as Euro 2008, is the 13th edition of the UEFA European Football Championship, a quadrennial football tournament for European nations. The tournament, which is being hosted by Austria and Switzerland, began on 7 June 2008 and is scheduled to conclude with the final at Ernst Happel Stadion in Vienna on 29 June 2008. It is the second successful joint bid in the competition's history, following the UEFA Euro 2000 hosted by Belgium and the Netherlands. The 2012 competition in Poland and Ukraine is scheduled to become the third jointly-hosted tournament.

A total of 16 teams are participating in the tournament. Austria and Switzerland automatically qualified as hosts; the remaining 14 teams were determined through qualifying matches which started in August 2006. Austria and Poland have both made their first appearance in the tournament. The winner of Euro 2008 will represent UEFA at the 2009 FIFA Confederations Cup in South Africa, unless Italy wins the tournament, in which case the runner-up will be entered, as Italy is already entered as the winner of the 2006 FIFA World Cup.

Bid process

Austria and Switzerland jointly bid to host the games, and faced major competition from Greece/Turkey, Scotland/Ireland, Russia, Hungary, Croatia/Bosnia-Herzegovina and a 4-way Nordic bid from Norway/Sweden/Denmark/Finland. Austria had already bid with another country before, which was Hungary for Euro 2004. They eventually lost to Portugal.

Austria/Switzerland, Greece/Turkey, and Hungary were recommended before the final vote. Greece and Turkey were rejected and let Hungary and Austria/Switzerland battle for the win.

Venues

The tournament will be played at eight venues throughout the two host nations; four in Austria and four in Switzerland. Each venue has a capacity of at least 30,000 for the tournament; the largest stadium is Ernst Happel Stadion in Vienna with a capacity of 53,295.^[1] It is for this reason that Ernst Happel Stadion will host the final. Switzerland will play all of its group stage matches at St. Jakob Park in Basel, which also hosted the opening match of the tournament as a compromise for the final being held in Vienna. Austria will play all of its group stage matches at Ernst Happel Stadion.

In 2004, the Zürich venue became a problem for the organisers. Originally, the Hardturm stadium was to be renovated and used as the city's venue, but legal challenges delayed the plan to a point that would not have allowed the ground to be used in 2008. This created a problem, as the agreement between UEFA and the organizers stipulated that four venues would be used in each country. The problem was solved when the organizers proposed renovating Letzigrund instead; UEFA approved the revised plan in January 2005. The Letzigrund stadium hosted its first football match on 23 September 2007.^[2]

Vienna	Klagenfurt	Salzburg	Innsbruck
Ernst Happel Stadion	Hypo-Arena	Wals Siezenheim Stadion	Tivoli Neu
Capacity: 53,295	Capacity: 31,957	Capacity: 31,020	Capacity: 31,600


Basel	Berne	Geneva	Zürich
St. Jakob-Park	Stade de Suisse	Stade de Genève	Letzigrund
Capacity: 42,000	Capacity: 31,907	Capacity: 31,228	Capacity: 30,000

New trophy

File:New Henri Delaunay Trophy.jpg

The new trophy for the UEFA Euro 2008 tournament

A new trophy will be awarded to the winners of the Euro 2008 tournament. The new version of the Henri Delaunay Trophy, created by Asprey London,^[3] is almost an exact replica of the original designed by Arthus-Bertrand. A small figure juggling a ball on the back of the original has been removed, as has the marble plinth. The silver base of the trophy also had to be enlarged to make it stable. The names of the winning countries that had appeared on the plinth have now been engraved on the back of the trophy, which is made of sterling silver, weighs 8 kilograms (17.6 lb) and is 60 centimetres (24 in) tall.

Qualifying

The draw for the qualifying round took place in Montreux, Switzerland on 27 January 2006 at 12:00 CET.

The qualifying process commenced a month after the 2006 World Cup. Austria and Switzerland automatically qualified for the tournament finals as host nations.

The qualifying format was changed compared to previous tournaments. The winners and runners-up from seven groups automatically qualified for the Championship, with the hosts filling the other two slots in the 16-team tournament. The change means there were no play-offs between teams finishing in second place in the groups - they qualified directly for the finals. Teams that finished in third place didn't have any further opportunity to qualify. Six of the qualifying groups contained seven teams, and the other, Group A, contained eight.

Qualified teams

Country	Qualified as	Date qualification was secured	Previous appearances in tournament¹
Austria	00Co-hosts	0012 December 2002	01 (debut appearance)
Switzerland	01Co-hosts	0112 December 2002	21 (1996, 2004)
Poland	02Group A winner	0917 November 2007	00 (debut appearance)
Portugal	03Group A runner-up	1421 November 2007	4 (1984, 1996, 2000, 2004)
Italy	04Group B winner	0617 November 2007	60 (1968, 1980, 1988, 1996, 2000, 2004)
France	05Group B runner-up	0717 November 2007	61 (1960, 1984, 1992, 1996, 2000, 2004)
Greece	06Group C winner	0317 October 2007	23 (1980, 2004)
Turkey	07Group C runner-up	1221 November 2007	22 (1996, 2000)
Czech Republic	08Group D winner	0517 October 2007	62 (1960², 1976², 1980², 1996, 2000, 2004)
Germany	09Group D runner-up	0213 October 2007	9 (1972³, 1976³, 1980³, 1984³, 1988³, 1992, 1996, 2000, 2004)
Croatia	10Group E winner	0817 November 2007	20 (1996, 2004)
Russia	11Group E runner-up	1521 November 2007	8 (1960⁴, 1964⁴, 1968⁴, 1972⁴, 1988⁴, 1992⁵, 1996, 2004)
Spain	12Group F winner	1117 November 2007	71 (1964, 1980, 1984, 1988, 1996, 2000, 2004)
Sweden	13Group F runner-up	1321 November 2007	30 (1992, 2000, 2004)
Romania	14Group G winner	0417 October 2007	31 (1984, 1996, 2000)
Netherlands	15Group G runner-up	1017 November 2007	70 (1976, 1980, 1988, 1992, 1996, 2000, 2004)

¹ Bold indicates champion for that year

² as Czechoslovakia

³ as West Germany

⁴ as Soviet Union

⁵ as Commonwealth of Independent States

Spain controversy

FIFA president Sepp Blatter threatened Spain with expulsion from international football had the Spanish government interfered in the election process of the Spanish Football Federation, but no action was deemed necessary.^[4]

Seeding

The draw for the final tournament took place on 2 December 2007 at the Culture and Convention Centre in Lucerne.^[5]

In a return to the format used at Euro 92 and Euro 96 the games in each group will be held at just two stadia, with the seeded team remaining in the same city for all three matches. As was the case at the 2000 and 2004 finals, the finalists were divided into four seeding pots, based on average points per game in the qualifying phases of the 2006 FIFA World Cup and Euro 2008, with each group having one team from each pot. Switzerland and Austria, as co-hosts, and Greece, as defending champions, were seeded first automatically.^[6]^[7] The Netherlands were seeded based on their UEFA coefficient in the Euro 2008 finalists ranking.

Pot 1	Pot 2	Pot 3	Pot 4
Switzerland (assigned to A1) Austria (assigned to B1) Greece Netherlands	Croatia Italy Czech Republic Sweden	Romania Germany Portugal Spain	Poland France Turkey Russia

Match officials

Twelve referees and twenty four assistants were selected for the tournament:^[8]

Football Association	Referee	Assistants
Austria	Konrad Plautz	Egon Bereuter	Markus Mayr
Belgium	Frank de Bleeckere	Peter Hermans	Alex Verstraeten
England	Howard Webb	Darren Cann	Mike Mullarkey
Germany	Herbert Fandel	Carsten Kadach	Volker Wezel
Greece	Kyros Vassaras	Dimitiris Bozartzidis	Dimitiris Saraidaris
Italy	Roberto Rosetti	Alessandro Griselli	Paolo Calcagno
Netherlands	Pieter Vink	Adriaan Inia	Hans ten Hoove
Norway	Tom Henning Øvrebø	Geir Åge Holen	Jan Petter Randen^[9]
Slovakia	Ľuboš Micheľ	Roman Slysko	Martin Balko
Spain	Manuel Mejuto González	Juan Carlos Yuste Jiménez	Jesús Calvo Guadamuro
Sweden	Peter Fröjdfeldt	Stefan Wittberg	Henrik Andren
Switzerland	Massimo Busacca	Matthias Arnet	Stephane Cuhat

Squads

Each nation had to submit a squad of 23 players, three of which had to be goalkeepers, by 28 May 2008. If a player was injured seriously enough to prevent his taking part in the tournament before his team's first match, he could be replaced by another player.^[10]

This happened in the case of Italy World Cup-winning captain Fabio Cannavaro who, following an injury in his team's first training session on June 2 which ruled him out of the tournament, was officially replaced with centre-back Alessandro Gamberini. Cannavaro did however opt to stay with his squad to offer support although if Italy were to win the tournament he would not hold the accolade of being the first player to captain his country to both World and European success. ^[11]

Results

All times are Central European Summer Time (UTC+2)

Group stage

In the following tables:

Pld = total games played
W = total games won
D = total games drawn (tied)
L = total games lost
GF = total goals scored (goals for)
GA = total goals conceded (goals against)
GD = goal difference (GF−GA)
Pts = total points accumulated

Group A

Team	Pld	W	L	GF	GA	GD	Pts
Portugal	1	1	0	2	0	+2	3
Czech Republic	1	1	0	1	0	+1	3
Switzerland	1	0	1	0	1	−1	0
Turkey	1	0	1	0	2	−2	0


7 June 2008
Switzerland	0 – 1	Czech Republic
Portugal	2 – 0	Turkey
11 June 2008
Czech Republic	v	Portugal
Switzerland	v	Turkey
15 June 2008
Switzerland	v	Portugal
Turkey	v	Czech Republic

Group B

Team	Pld	W	L	GF	GA	GD	Pts
Germany	1	1	0	2	0	+2	3
Croatia	1	1	0	1	0	+1	3
Austria	1	0	1	0	1	−1	0
Poland	1	0	1	0	2	−2	0


8 June 2008
Austria	0 – 1	Croatia
Germany	2 – 0	Poland
12 June 2008
Croatia	v	Germany
Austria	v	Poland
16 June 2008
Poland	v	Croatia
Austria	v	Germany

Group C

Team	Pld	D	Pts
France	1	1	1
Romania	1	1	1
Netherlands	0	0	0
Italy	0	0	0


9 June 2008
Romania	0 – 0	France
Netherlands	2 – 0	Italy
13 June 2008
Italy	v	Romania
Netherlands	v	France
17 June 2008
Netherlands	v	Romania
France	v	Italy

Group D

Team	Pld	W	D	L	GF	GA	GD	Pts
Greece	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0
Sweden	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0
Spain	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0
Russia	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0


10 June 2008
Spain	v	Russia
Greece	v	Sweden
14 June 2008
Sweden	v	Spain
Greece	v	Russia
18 June 2008
Greece	v	Spain
Russia	v	Sweden

Tiebreakers

Should two teams from the same group finish with an equal number of points, they will be ranked based on the following criteria:^[12]

Number of points earned in matches between the teams in question;
Goal difference in matches between the teams in question (in cases where there are more than two teams equal on points);
Goals scored in matches between the teams in question (in cases where there are more than two teams equal on points);
Goal difference in all group matches;
Goals scored in all group matches;
In cases where exactly two teams are equal in all previously listed critera and play one another to a draw in their final group match, kicks from the penalty mark will be conducted in lieu of the remaining criteria;
The number of points obtained by the teams in question divided by the number of matches played in the qualifying competitions for the 2006 FIFA World Cup and Euro 2008;
Fair play conduct of the teams in the group stage;
Drawing of lots.

Knockout stage

The knockout stage is different from that of past tournaments. Teams in groups A and B will be separated from teams in groups C and D until the final. The reason for the format change is to equalise the rest periods during the knockout stage. However, this compromises the unpredictability of the competition, as there is, firstly, a greater chance of a group fixture being replayed in the knockout stage; and secondly, the impossibility of a final between two teams drawn in the same half of the tournament. Also, in another major change, for the first time in a European Championship, only two venues (St. Jakob-Park, Basel and Ernst Happel Stadion, Vienna) will be used for the seven matches in the knockout stage of the tournament.^[13]

Quarter-finals	Semi-finals	Final

19 June - Basel

Winner Group A
	25 June - Basel
Runner-up Group B
	Winner of QF1
20 June - Vienna
	Winner of QF2
Winner Group B
		29 June - Vienna
Runner-up Group A
		Winner of SF1
21 June - Basel
		Winner of SF2
Winner Group C
	26 June - Vienna
Runner-up Group D
	Winner of QF3
22 June - Vienna
	Winner of QF4
Winner Group D

Runner-up Group C

Quarter-finals

2008-06-19