THE Prime Minister has offered up Britain’s stadiums for the European Championships in just three months' time, with plans for vaccine passports and mass-testing to allow Wembley to reach 90,000 capacity by the finals.
The tournament’s semi-finals and finals are already scheduled for the stadium in July but Boris Johnson said if other matches need to be hosted in the UK “we are certainly on for that”.
Next month England will see trials into how to get fans back into football grounds safely.
UK Government ministers are now in talks with UEFA amid fears that plans to host the matches across 11 European cities may be hit by increasing coronavirus cases.
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Johnson touted the successful roll-out of the vaccine in the UK and said: “We are hosting the Euros. We are hosting the semis and the final.
“If there’s, you know, if they want any other matches that they want hosted, we’re certainly on for that but at the moment that’s where we are with UEFA.”
For those who want to see the UK host the World Cup in 2030, it is felt having the Euros here would demonstrate the capabilities to hold big matches.
The Sun reported that Rishi Sunak will put aside £2.8 million in today’s Budget to promote the UK and Ireland’s bid to hold the World Cup.
Let's bring football home in 2030.
— Boris Johnson (@BorisJohnson) March 2, 2021
I would love for the home of football to host the 2030 World Cup, and it would be a wonderful thing for the whole country to savour.
We want to do much more to encourage sport post-pandemic and see a bonanza of football in the years ahead. https://t.co/TsCmlKTLMW
Johnson added: “The vaccination programme has given us a great deal more certainty than we might otherwise have had.”
The plan to pack stadia for matches is at odds with advice from Covid-19 experts, who doubt international travel will return this year.
Sage adviser Mike Tildesley is one of those who has argued that the UK must emerge slowly from lockdown, and indicated trips abroad are off the menu this year.
This morning Business Secretary Kwasi Kwarteng played down suggestions that Britain could host additional Euro 2020 matches this summer as the coronavirus vaccine drives down infections.
“It is March 2 now. I don’t want to run ahead of ourselves,” he told Sky News.
“The information is very encouraging, the vaccine rollout has been very successful. I don’t want to over-egg it. I don’t want to say we are completely free of coronavirus. There are still dangers ahead.
“The numbers are encouraging but I don’t think it would be right for me to speculate about football tournaments in two or three months’ time.”
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