Euro 2020 a year later: Football caravan from London to Baku and from Saint Petersburg to Rome

The list of participants for the 16th European Football Championship has finally been completed - eight months later than expected.

The coronavirus pandemic not only postponed the four League of Nations playoff finals, in which Hungary, Slovakia, Scotland and North Macedonia took out the last visas for the Euros, but also postponed the entire championship for a year.

Instead of June 12 to July 12, 2020, football's biggest continental showdown will take place from June 11 to July 11, 2021.

Uefa kept the old year in the name - it will officially be "Euro 2020", I guess so as not to spoil the anniversary - 60 years since the first European Championship was held in France in 1960.

It was precisely because of that jubilee that the leaders of the European Football Confederation came up with the revolutionary idea of ​​not holding the European Championship in just one (12 times so far), or in two countries (three times - European Championship in Belgium and the Netherlands in 2000, Austria and Switzerland in 2008 and Ukraine and Poland 2012) already in - 12 different countries, 12 different cities.

This diverse plan, holding a football caravan from London in the west to Baku in the east, from St. Petersburg in the north to Rome in the south, could be spoiled "only" by the coronavirus pandemic, but for now Uefa remains committed to playing in 12 different countries .

Countries such as Romania (Bucharest), Hungary (Budapest), Ireland (Dublin), Scotland (Glasgow), Denmark (Copenhagen) and Azerbaijan (Baku) should be hosting matches of a major competition for the first time in history, and they will play are still in the Netherlands (Amsterdam), Spain (Bilbao) and Munich (Germany).

The opening is at the Olympic Stadium in Rome, where Italy - Turkey will meet on June 11 at 21 p.m., and the final (semi-final and final match) will be held at London's temple of football, Wembley.

The composition of the groups has been known since November 30 last year, when the draw was held in Bucharest, and through the League of Nations, groups C (North Macedonia), D (Scotland), E (Slovakia) and F (Hungary) were filled two nights ago. The championship will be held in the same format as in 2016 in France - again almost half of Europe, 24 national teams, will participate in the finals, which will compete in six groups of four teams each.

The two first-placed teams from each group and the four best third-placed national teams will advance to the round of XNUMX.

There are two debutants - Finland, which went to the Euros directly from the qualifiers, as well as North Macedonia, which was able to do so thanks to the "mercy" of UEFA, which enabled one selection from the D League of Nations, where the lowest-ranked national teams were placed, to qualify. to the finale. There are indications that the qualification system will be changed, that League D will no longer have a place, but whatever - the Macedonians took advantage of the gift.

For the first time in history, the hosts of the Euros did not have a guaranteed place in the finals, so the Republic of Ireland, even though it will be played in Dublin, or Romania, even though it will be played in Bucharest, "floated". Azerbaijan was not even close to playing European Championship matches in Baku.