Euro 2012 - Ukraine and Poland

The Bundesliga promises a lot of action this year, with four teams capable of competing for the prize. Germany’s strong showing at the 2006 World Cup helped improve the league in the eyes of many spectators, and it seems to have become more competitive as a result. This season, quite a few players possessing a good amount of quality have joined the league- coveted French winger Franck Ribery and World Cup winner Luca Toni being amongst those that came in. Better player coming into the league only raises the standard as a whole- in the past, the Bundesliga was regarded just as good as the Premiership, La Liga or Serie A; they will hope to reach those heights yet again.

Best Teams

VFB Stuttgart

VFB Stuttgart came out on top in an exciting title race last season, beating off the strong challenges of the teams below them. That was their first league title since 1992- their fans will be hungry for more after experiencing the sweet taste of success. Looking to challenge again, VFB Stuttgart brought in Turkish attacking midfielder Yildiray Basturk, Brazilian striker Ewerthon and Brazilian defender Gledson to strengthen their squad. With Ewerthon and Mario Gomez up front, they have two of the best strikers in the division, and will undoubtedly score a lot of goals this year.

Schalke 04

Last season Schalke led the way for most of the title race, before falling off the pace at the end and being pipped to title by VFB Stuttgart- the team they finished just two points behind. This was almost as heartbreaking as their finish in the 2001 season, where they were beaten to the title by Bayern Munich in the fourth minute of injury time in the last game of the season. They will hope to push on from this and do better this year, and with players such as Kevin Kuranyi, Gerald Asamoah and Halil Altintop in the side, they certainly have the potential to do so.

Werder Bremen

Werder Bremen finished third last season, a mere four points behind the champions. This year they will hope to improve and finish higher, and maybe even repeat their title win of 2004. Werder Bremen have a strong squad despite the loss of star striker Miroslav Klose to Bayern Munich, and with the likes of Torsten Frings, Diego and Ivan Klasnic, they will always prove a threat up front. Finishing is not their only strong point, with them also being competent defensively- Per Mertesacker and goalkeeper Tim Wiese help them stay strong at the back.

Bayern Munich

Last year Bayern Munich finished fourth and thus had to play in the lower level UEFA Cup- they have spend a lot of money to make sure that this does not happen again. Bayern spent around seventy million euros in the transfer market, bringing in players like Ribery, Toni, Miroslav Klose and Ze Roberto- all proven performers at the top level of the game. This season they will look to win the UEFA Cup as well as the league title that they underperformed in last season. With experienced manager Ottmar Hitzfeld extending his contract at the club, it is near impossible that Bayern will go without a major trophy this year as they did last.

Jason Pereira

Founder of Football Specifics ( http://www.footballspecs.net )

Ukraine will spend around $600 million of its 2008 budget funds on preparations for the Euro 2012 football championship, deputy finance minister Sergei Rybak said Monday.In April UEFA President Michel Platini announced that Ukraine and Poland had been chosen as joint hosts for the 2012 Euro Cup. The joint bid from the two countries was chosen ahead of Italy and another joint bid from Croatia and Hungary.

“The economics ministry has worked out a Euro-2012 program on financing and preparations for the championship. I believe the program will be prepared and confirmed by the government by the end of the year,” Rybak said.

Earlier this year Andriy Sadovy, the mayor of Lvov, said the western Ukrainian city would allocate at least $1 billion for the championship. The funds will be spent on renovating and rebuilding tourist and sports infrastructure and facilities in the city, which is home to around 860,000.

The selected venues for the championship in Poland are Gdansk, Poznan, Warsaw, Wroclaw and Chorzow, while Ukraine has proposed stadiums in Dnepropetrovsk, Donetsk, Kiev and Lvov.

The Spanish La Liga is seen as one of the best leagues in the world, right up there along with the English Premiership and Italy’s Serie A. Some of the best players in the world have plied their trade in Spain’s top tier- including the likes of Zinedine Zidane, Ronaldo and even greats in older times like Diego Maradona and Ferenc Puskas when they were playing at club level. La Liga is known as a technical league, with a continental style of football being played- meaning if you want to watch players that can mesmerize you there is no better league to watch.

Best teams

Real Madrid

Real Madrid won the league last season after a thrilling title race and will be looking to do so again this year. The club has long been associated with big spending and the famous Galacticos Era, a time during which they broke many transfer records to buy some of the biggest players in the game. Blessed with quality in all areas of the pitch, Real still spent upwards of 100 million euros to strengthen their squad in the hope that this would bring them more success.

Barcelona

Barcelona were beaten to the title on the last day of the season by Real Madrid by the virtue of Madrid’s superior head to head record- they will be hungry to regain the title that was theirs in 2005/06. Barcelona possess one of the best attacking lineups in the world, with players that can hurt you at any time. Dubbed the Fantastic Four by Spanish media, Thierry Henry, Leo Messi, Samuel Eto’o and Ronaldinho will look to try and win their team the title.

Sevilla

Sevilla shocked everyone last season when they competed in a frenetic title race all to the last day of the season, even leading the table at one point early in the year. Sevilla have a young team slowly growing in world football and while they do not have the many stars that the two teams above them have, they have plenty of players possessing a decent level of skill, and are worth a lot more than the sum of their parts.

Valencia

Valencia finished a distant fourth last year, ten points away from the champions; this year they will look to challenge for the title from the off. Valencia have many of the young stars of the game in the likes of David Silva and Manuel Fernandes- they also have one of the most coveted strikers in the game in David Villa up front. Valencia have already won the La Liga title twice this millennium; their fans will desperately hope they can do it again.

Founder of Football Specifics http://www.footballspecs.net

As the Chelsea fans approach Stamford Bridge this weekend there will be a thought in the back of their minds that things won’t be quite the same anymore. The Special One finally fell on his sword this week and decided that he could no longer satisfy his bosses need for success…

…but they forget just how well Mourinho has done. Two consecutive Premiership victories just could not hide the fact that all the Chelsea board are interested in is the Champions League, the one trophy Jose just couldn’t bring home.

So, what can we learn from this? As a football fan we all want our team to win - we want them to win well, and Chelsea have been winning exeptional well since Mourinho arrived from Porto. Now there’s a thing, he came from Portugal on the back of a Champions League success and there is no doubt that Abramovich expected him to do the same again.

Chelsea fans will most likely remember Mourinho as the man that brought them great success, great football and great players. The rest of us will breath a sigh of relief as Chelsea begin the task of restructuring and building a new team under a new manager, a chance to catch up, a chance to overtake. Only the men at the top will know why they wanted Mourinho out, for the rest of us we can only regret the fact that one of the worlds top managers has escaped.

Lets hope that one day the great sport of football returns to us with sport as the focus, not as a business. Big clubs are making more and more money all the time, smaller clubs are becoming extinct and people like Mourinho are needed to show what passion there is behind the game.

Duncan Rice is the webmaster of the live football scores website latestfootballscores.co.uk and the website design and hosting service pagesurfer.

An amateur webmaster but expert footie fan, you can expect to see articles relating to football (hate the word football) and the world which revoloves around it. A great man once said ‘football is not about life and death - it’s more important than that’. I agree.

Berlin mayor Klaus Wowereit Tuesday offered help to Warsaw in preparing for the 2012 European Football Championship in Poland and Ukraine.

Source: Xinhua

Created: Monday, September 24. 2007

A new company contracted to build Poland’s National Stadium in Warsaw will be appointed in a few days and a unit responsible for the preparations of the organisation of the EURO 2012 Championships as a whole will be in place, informed Polish Minister of Sports El?bieta Jakubiak today, after a meeting with the organisational committee for the central Masovia region.

“Construction work will commence in spring 2009,” assured the Minister.

Preparatory work for the future National Stadium on pasture grounds in Warsaw continue, and the merchants of the adjacent huge bazaar at the 10th Anniversary Stadium, which initially was planned to be re-built for the Championships, are to be removed by the end of September in accordance with previous agreements.

Minister Jakubiak appealed to the organisational committees for fast preparation of lists of enterprises connected with Euro 2012 so that they could be included in the Cabinet’s ordinance implemented within the framework of the Euro 2012 Act.

The Minister announced also that on Thursday she will meet with the authorities of the cities where Euro 2012 objects are to be erected in order to inform them about a simplified procedure of commissioning, concerning mainly projects of stadiums.

The designers of future stadiums should be appointed by the end of this year. Otherwise there are no chances of constructing the facilities on time, Jakubiak stressed.

Poland is to co-host the Finals of Euro 2012 Football Championships with Ukraine.

The next days will see the foundation of a company to build a National Stadium and a unit overseeing other preparations for the 2012 European football championship, Polish sports minister Elzbieta Jakubiak said on Monday.

Source: Xinhua

100 parts of the turf, 50 x 50 cm, from the Silesian Stadium in Chorz?south western Poland, the official home stadium of the Polish national football team, will be put up for an internet auction, while hopes for organising Euro 2012 finals in Silesia remain.

The grass put up for the auction was lying on the pitch for some 20 years. It was removed for instalment of a new heated football ground. Parts of the turf will be put on the training pitch and some grass will be sold in wooden boxes at the auction.

The starting price of a turf square is 100 z?otys. The auction will last till October 5 and the funds raised in the bidding will be assigned for charity.

The heating system will be ready before Poland’s team match against Belgium on November 17.

The renovation of the stadium is a part of a plan to regain its chances to host some matches during the finals of the Euro 2012 Championships. The Silesian Stadium was put in the reserve list, but many people in Silesia still believe that the stadium has chances to take part in this prestigious event.

“We will fulfil the conditions of the stadium agreement with the UEFA. The Silesian Stadium will be ready two years before Euro 2012, so that it could be properly tested,” said Janusz Moszy?ski, head of the Silesian Vioivodship.

Poland are to co-host the Euro 2012 Football Championships with Ukraine. In Poland the matches will be played in Warsaw, Pozna?, Gda?sk and Wroc?aw, but there is a chance the organising cities could be joined by Chorz?nd Krak?hich so far were on the reserve list.

By Ron Popeski

KANIV, Ukraine, Sept 19 (Reuters) - Ukraine’s president says he is pressing Kiev authorities to solve a row over a building site which threatens to disqualify the city’s main stadium from hosting the final of the 2012 European football championship.

Viktor Yushchenko was speaking after UEFA president Michel Platini said Kiev’s 84,000-seat Olympic stadium could not be used for Euro 2012, to be held jointly with Poland, unless construction of a nearby shopping centre was halted.

“I issued new instructions three days ago for Kiev city authorities to take appropriate decisions on this matter in conjunction with the owners of the site,” Yushchenko told Reuters in an interview late on Tuesday in central Ukraine.

“I met the owner and he said he was prepared to take a wrecker’s ball and demolish the site if (international football officials) confirm that this is a vital condition for the stadium to function.”

The site owner was also prepared, he said, to amend building plans “including norms on the ground level concerning proper evacuation (of fans)” — UEFA’s chief concern.

International football authorities have long warned that unless the construction is stopped they will withdraw permission to hold matches at the stadium.

SPACE LIMITATIONS

Ukraine’s Interior Ministry this month, citing crowd control concerns, limited ticket sales to 41,000 at Ukraine’s European 2008 qualifying match against Italy.

In a letter last week to the head of Ukraine’s football federation, Platini said blockage of exits and space limitations meant the stadium “clearly cannot host matches for Euro 2012. We therefore hope and believe that the appropriate state bodies in Ukraine will adopt the necessary decisions immediately.”

Yushchenko, who played a key role in Ukraine and Poland winning the right earlier this year to host Euro 2012, has issued a decree ordering the dismantling of the building site.

Four Ukrainian cities are to host matches — Dipropetrovsk, Donetsk, Kiev and Lviv.

Ukraine and Poland, both ex-communist countries, face huge logistical tasks in upgrading transport and communication links and building hotels.

In his comments to Reuters, Yushchenko renewed criticism of the early organisation. He has already accused the government, led by his arch rival Viktor Yanukovich, of failing to take preparations seriously.

“Many things that were supposed to have been completed by the organising committee have not been implemented,” he said. “I have sent several letters warning the organising committee to change its approach towards the construction timetable.”

Poland’s president Lech Kaczynski on Wednesday signed into law the bill on the 2012 European football games finals.

Source: Xinhua