While packing his bags in preparation for heading over to Geneva, Scotland and Ireland EURO2008 project director John Henderson took time out to offer his views on the chances of the joint bid. He has always been upfront and confident that the bid put together by Scotland and Ireland is the best. He only has 8 days to wait to see if his confidence is justified. The SFA-FAI delegation will be flying to the home of UEFA in the next couple of days to prepare for their presentation on 11th December. UEFA will announce their decision on Thursday, 12th December. Henderson said: "We have never been overconfident but there's no doubt we are up there with the Nordic bid. We have the top stadiums that can provide more than adequate facilities for this event and we have fans who are unrivalled throughout the world. We are aware that we have tough competition, but I think we will win and I am confident that we have a very good bid. Four of our proposed main stadia are in place which none of our competition has, and I feel that UEFA have been impressed with our bid." Scotland's Minister of Sport Mike Watson was also willing to continue to give the joint bid his full backing. The two governments and associations are convinced that nothing more could have been done to persuade UEFA. The Minister said: "We are in the final straight and we won't be slacking until we reach that finishing line. We do believe that we couldn't have done anything better." There will, of course, be similar statements being made from those involved in the competing bids from Austria and Switzerland, Greece and Turkey, Russia, Hungary, Croatia and Bosnia and Nordic 2008 involving the Scandinavian countries. EURO2008? Why the hell not! | |||
Ger Harley (ger@scottishfitba.net) |
