EM 2028: In qualification, hosts have to show that they are worth it!

EM 2028: In qualification, hosts have to show that they are worth it!

Wales, Großbritannien - On May 21, 2025, UEFA published decisive information about the 2028 European Football Championship. Accordingly, the tournament will take place from June 9th to July 9th, 2028, with England, Wales, Ireland and Scotland. Despite the orientation of the tournament in these four nations, the hosts do not receive a free ticket for the European Championship, as krone.at reports. All four nations have to prove themselves in one of twelve groups of qualification.

Two reserved places for the two best of the hosts will be awarded, unless they are qualified directly. The qualification itself is held in groups with four or five teams each. The twelve group winners and the eight best group runners -up are directly qualified.

stages and infrastructure

The EM 2028 is held in a total of nine stadiums, six of which are in England. Glasgow, Cardiff and Dublin are the other venues. According to [Wikipedia] (https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/fu%C3%9Fball-European Championship_2028), the associations had to present at least ten stadiums with various capacities when applying, including one with over 60,000 places.

Northern Ireland could have difficulty performing as a host. Windsor Park does not meet the required requirements, and the British government has announced that it does not provide any funds for the new building of Casement Park because the costs have increased drastically. Talks with the UEFA about the role of Northern Ireland are already planned. It is even considered a temporary stadium in Belfast in order to be able to play five games in Northern Ireland.

qualification and preparations

The qualification for the EM 2024, which is scheduled to take place in 2024, has already been completed, with Germany being automatically qualified as a host. For the EM 2028, 53 participating nations have to compete against each other in ten groups, whereby the qualification groups were drawn on October 9, 2022. The group games of the qualification included several game days between March and November 2023, whereby the remaining places will be awarded by a play-off tournament, which will take place in March 2024, as [wikipedia] (https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/fu%C3%9Fball-European Championship_2024/qualification) specifies.

For the transfer rights of the EM-2024 and the EM-2028, several channels have already concluded contracts. The first and ZDF have secured the rights for all 51 games of the final round, while ServusTV has achieved transmission rights for special qualification games.