DESPITE their symbolic role at the head of the Union, no member of the royal family has attended a football game played by a home nation other than England this century, according to the official court circular.
In fact, members of the royal family have attended more England football games in the past two weeks than they have matches played by Wales, Scotland, and Northern Ireland combined in the past two decades.
The most recent time a royal saw an international football match played by a home nation other than England was in 1998, when Prince Edward watched Scotland’s World Cup game against Norway.
Six days before that, the late Duke of Edinburgh watched Scotland play Brazil.
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In 2009, the Duke of York, Prince Andrew, “met members of the Welsh national football team in Azerbaijan, prior to their World Cup qualifying match in Baku”. He did not, according to the court circular, stay to watch them play.
At Euro 2020, Prince William has so far attended two England games. He saw them play the Czech Republic in the group stages, and again when they played Germany in the round of 16.
Wales and Scotland also qualified for the European competition, with Wales making it out of the group stage, but no royals attended their matches.
Wales made it to the semi-finals of Euro 2016, but no royals attended. Instead, William and Charles sent messages of encouragement.
Prince William is also the president of the Football Association, a role he has held since 2006 according to the royal.uk website.
It adds: "Within this role, he has supported the provision of world class facilities for our national team." It is referring to England.
The last time, and only time since 1998, a member of the royal family saw an international football game which did not involve England was in 2014, when Prince Harry saw Brazil play Cameroon in the 2014 World Cup.
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Although Scotland had not been in a major tournament for 23 years before Euro 2020, that should not have impacted on royal decisions to attend their matches.
In fact, in 2003 Prince Andrew saw the England Youth Team play Japan, and in 2007 Prince William attended a Euro 2008 qualifying match between England and Croatia.
The royal circular also reveals that, despite royal attendance at the FA Cup final being a relatively regular occurrence, there is no such pattern in Scottish championships.
The court circular covers all the royals' official engagements back to 1997.
A royal family spokesperson declined to comment, and declined to say if there were plans for royals to attend games other than England ones in the future.
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