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Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland Could Triple Co-Host Euro 2016
Comments(7)
At least three countries – Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland – are already planning a possible bid to host Euro 2016. Not as rival bids, but as triple co-hosts. Or tri-hosts, if you prefer. It’s all “tentative” right now, but it could happen.
I’ve long believed that having European Championships co-hosts is a detriment to the tournament. Mostly because out of 16 teams, two don’t have to qualify. That’s one eighth of all teams. And in some cases those teams wouldn’t necessarily have qualified – see Austria and Switzerland this past summer.
Expanding the Euros to 24 team (which is on the cards for 2016) would make co-hosting less problematic. But if we expand the number of hosts along with the number of teams, we end up back where we started, with one eighth of the teams qualifying automatically.
On one hand I’d love to see Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland pulling triple co-hosting duties in 2016. The atmosphere would be incredible and there would be plenty of fantastic stadiums to choose from – Hampden Park, Ibrox Stadium, Celtic Park, Millennium Stadium (pictured). But on the other hand I get the feeling that three co-hosts is at least one too many.
Maybe they could convince Northern Ireland to be only an honorary part of the bid. When the BeNeLux were proposing a bid, they made it clear that Luxembourg would not receive automatic qualification. That could work for this. Still, it doesn’t bode well that none of them made it into Euro 2008…
Personally, I think almost every other Euro (and even World Cup!) should now be co-hosted. There’s plenty of countries that can’t pull off each event alone, but could do so easily by combining with another country. This would open up the field of eligible hosts, which has honestly shrunk ever since the 32 team expansion and now that security has become so much more costly (post 9/11). In South America alone, imagine how many countries could combine to succesfully host a World Cup that couldn’t hold it alone; Uruguay, Chile, Colombia…
Posted from 
United States
I like the idea of co-hosting without qualifying, and wasn’t aware that Luxembourg wouldn’t qualify as part of the Benelux bid.
Overall, I suppose if a nation is given a choice between either 1) co-hosting and going through qualification process or 2) not co-hosting and going through qualification process, then the first option is still preferable.
i like the idea of the trifecta of atmosphere that would be included in this bid. However, three countries that have difficulty qualifying in the first place should not all get automatic qualification. Especially if, in Northern Ireland’s case, they probably won’t bring to much to the package. Bra’s idea is probably the best fit for the bid.
too bad wales dosent exist in the world of football…..
Posted from United States
If you look at the Euro 2008 qualifiers, both Scotland and Northern Ireland would have qualified if it had been a 24 team Euro, so it’s not that unreasonble for them to be in the finals automtically. And if it’s the very first 24 team Euro, I don’t see it being that significant.
And at least it’s not as bad s the four-way Norway-Sweden-Denmark-Finland bid for 2008.
Posted from 
Canada
God! Enough with these co-hosting/tri-hosting/whatever the hell else. What happened to the good old days where we only had ONE nation as a host?
Thank you Korea and Japan for starting this awful trend.
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I don’t think I can handle a tri-host bid, even with the tournament featuring 24 teams.
Like you say Daryl, three is still too many — no matter the number of teams in the field. I think — and no offence to Northern Ireland — but maybe Wales and Scotland should scrap Northern Ireland from the mix and stick with a double-bid. I don’t know the specifics…but what is Northern Ireland offering to the pact?
Posted from
Canada