European Cup Trivia

[ursus arctos]

I knew that would piss you off

[Alex Anderson]

The 2020 final venue should be announced today - either the Ataturk in Istanbul or the Luz in Lisbon.

Ataturk got it.

Gdansk got the Europa League.

[ursus arctos]

In recompense, I offer you the following factoid.

The opening day of the Stadio Olimpico (not yet called that) in 1953 featured BOTH a full football international between Italy and Hungary AND the finish of the 6th stage of the Giro d’Italia.

[Alex Anderson]

I knew that would piss you off

Aw. It's always when I think we're having a nice chat too. Don't go all "Richard Gere before Julia Roberts makes him walk barefoot on the grass".

You'll have to be more specific.

[Alex Anderson]

In recompense, I offer you the following factoid.

The opening day of the Stadio Olimpico (not yet called that) in 1953 featured BOTH a full football international between Italy and Hungary AND the finish of the 6th stage of the Giro d’Italia.

That same day Hampden hosted darts, snooker, a rugby league final and a bandy international with Sweden in the evening when the pitch froze ... recompense that muthafunster!

It's just been revoked!

Etc.

[Third rate Leszno]

Ataturk got it.

Gdansk got the Europa League.

Pleased about Gdańsk, less so that it won’t be Lisbon, and that Drury or whoever will be wanking on about Liverpool’s destiny to go back to the scene of their greatest triumph* from the first minute of their first group game**.


* Always assuming they don’t do something even more improbable in the intervening period.

** If they even manage to qualify for the CL in two seasons time.

[Alex Anderson]

I always found Drury a bit much. Until ...

He's an icon for my mob now.

[Third rate Leszno]

Heh! Nacho Novo too - I treasure the memory of one of his cameo substitute appearances for Carlisle in an away game at Prenton Park, the finest display of enthusiastically aimless running about I’ve seen since the bloke down the road gave his red setter a gram of speed and a can of Relentless.

[Alex Anderson]

And the wee man never stopped running wild til he had a heart attack a couple of months back. He's alright now tho.

[seand]

And the wee man never stopped running wild til he had a heart attack a couple of months back. He's alright now tho.

Nacho Novo or the red setter?

[seand]

Has to be Wembley for most events. Lots of the 48 Olympics, Clay v Cooper, NFL, baseball, tons of rugby league but also RU internationals including Wales when Millennium Stadium being built , gaelic games, speedway, greyhound racing, field hockey, the Pope, Live Aid and every mega group imaginable, WWF

[tee rex]

Which leads us on to "Stadiums that will never host the final because they're in the wrong city". Such as the [insert sponsor] homes of Arsenal, West Ham, expanded Chelsea? Nobody muscles in on Wembley's turf.

[Walt Flanagans Dog]

Has to be Wembley for most events. Lots of the 48 Olympics, Clay v Cooper, NFL, baseball, tons of rugby league but also RU internationals including Wales when Millennium Stadium being built , gaelic games, speedway, greyhound racing, field hockey, the Pope, Live Aid and every mega group imaginable, WWF

Plus show jumping and Evel Knievel. Not at the same time, unfortunately.

[Alex Anderson]

Nacho Novo or the red setter?

What a genuinely shitty little post.

[Alex Anderson]

Which leads us on to "Stadiums that will never host the final because they're in the wrong city". Such as the [insert sponsor] homes of Arsenal, West Ham, expanded Chelsea? Nobody muscles in on Wembley's turf.

Ibrox and Parkhead. Maybe you could add the new Spartak stadium in Moscow, which'll probably - like Cardiff City - get a Super Cup final but will never outrank the Luzhniki/Millenium/Principality.

Probably both too wee anyway.

Sporting's Jose Alvalade (sic?).

Think it's a national thing in certain cases as well. Old Trafford would never have got it if Wembley had been available at that point.

Italy's spread it between the San Siro and Rome's Olimpico but it's weird that Bari got it yet Napoli never has. German equiv of Napoli is surely Schalke and Gelsenkirchen got it as well as Two Munichs and a Berlin.

EDIT: And Stuttgart - and so probably others in both Germany and Italy which I've forgotten about. Off the top of the head Frankfurt, Hannover and Nuremberg are other big classic grounds, revamped to various degrees, which haven't had the big final but, like, Dortmund's Westfalen, two of them had smaller European finals (The Waldstadion only getting the 1980 UEFA Cup final leg coz Eintracht were in it). This must be due to the comparative proximity - from a UEFA and even DFB point of view, of those German grounds what did get it.

The Manzanares/Calderon. Although the Wanda Metripolitano is about to take it off the Bernabeu.

Betis are surely back in the Seville game tho. Their place looks fucking ace now.

[Alex Anderson]

... and the most tragic example is surely Rotterdam. It's an absolute disgrace the final has never been in Het Kasteel.

And what with UEFA's ticket allocation policy, I don't think the support of either finalist would be any worse off.

[Alex Anderson]

... and Lisbon's Estadio Nacional only has as much hedge down one side as Brechin's utterly beautiful Glebe Park.

Not grounds in the same city, I know, but in terms of seminal Rangers nightmares they're in the same fucking street.

[ursus arctos]

Bari got it because the ground was built by the Italian FA president’s construction firm, creating certain “synergies”. It is by far the most unlikely venue for a final.

The Arena aufSchalke is a world class facility in the middle of a major population centre with excellent transport links, though it is true that punters’ hotels were all over the Ruhr.

Neither of the Sevilla club grounds is likely to be nominated as long as the white elephant of their “Olympic” stadium remains massively under-used.

[Kevin S]

Why don't they move the Copa Del Rey final there in perpetuity? (Or rotate with Montjuic... how many big empty stadia does one country need?)

[Alex Anderson]

Plus they had that other fully-roofed monster of a stadium in Seville which no-one (except ursus) had heard of until Celtic played there in the Uefa Cup final. It's probably ending up like Glasgow in terms of any tournament bids - too many stadiums for too few hotel facilities.

[Alex Anderson]

... sorry - Ursus mentioned the Seville Olympic stadium at the end of his last post above.

Told you he'd know about it.

[ursus arctos]

The Copa Del Rey Final is likely to become a Wanda Metropolitano thing.

The current RFEF will never put it in Catalunya for fear of anti-Royal demonstrations and Madrid is much more central than Sevilla.

[Alex Anderson]

Bari got it because the ground was built by the Italian FA president’s construction firm, creating certain “synergies”. It is by far the most unlikely venue for a final.

The Arena aufSchalke is a world class facility in the middle of a major population centre with excellent transport links, though it is true that punters’ hotels were all over the Ruhr.

Yup - the only thing that's consistent is the inconsistency. And that there'll be financial skulduggery at the heart of any Italian decision.

My favourite is the new Wembley getting it twice in three years (second time for the 150th anniversary of the FA and, I assume, the first just because of a general "we've spent all this money on it - come on!") although the Prater/Ernst Happel got it twice in four years (with Wembley also getting it three times from 1963 to 1971).

The worst, of course, is Heysel getting it - yet again - in 1985, when it was falling to fucking pieces (Obviously there was more to it than that - but this is a trivia thread so I'll leave it there).

It feels like the policy has been one of traditional favourites (a notion I generally like - even I don't want Ibrox to ever get it over Hampden) interspersed with, as you say, whoever schmoozed the best.

In my brief, first-hand experience of Italian football, the northern hatred of Napoli was bloody unbelievable in its virulence and this, I had assumed, was always why Naples - one of the world's greatest football centres - never got the final. [EDIT: the political angle ursus cites re Spain ... also why a bastion like the Nou Camp has had the final twice yet the Bernabeu has had it four times and Madrid, as a city will have had it five times next year]

But Puglia's pretty far down the boot isn't it, ursus? You'll know better than me - and I know the San Paulo's not as pristine as it could be - but is Naples' problem that it just doesn't want it enough, won't bribe the right people? Or is it the old "most dangerous city in Europe" thing?

I mean Glasgow's had it three times ffs ...

The San Nicola is at least a beautiful stadium (well, it looks like one on the telly anyway - never been - and it was brand new in 1991) and certainly provided a suitable backdrop to the occasion. It was certainly more suited to hosting the European Cup final than say, even by the standards of the day, the Wankdorf in Berne.

But, rather than a 3rd place play-off like Bari, the Wankdorf had hosted the actual final of the World Cup final ... all probably powered by the whole FIFA-in-Switzerland thing.

And then, I suppose, as supporters have become more able to travel to venues in bigger numbers the whole "surrounding infrastructure" thing counts more ...

[ursus arctos]

Bari is a few kilometres north of Napoli, on the other side of the peninsula.

Napoli have never had any influence within the Italian Federation, likely for all the reasons you mention.

Unfortunately, but not at all unsurprisingly, the San Nicola is falling apart, with parts even having been closed for safety reasons at various points.

[Alex Anderson]

Anyway, a fascinating point, tee rex.

And you're making me have to ask one of those questions for which there is no right answer but some us are bound to be ultra certain about - WHAT IS THE MOST GLARING OMISSION? Which is the most deserving stadium never to have hosted the ECCC/UCL Final?



Is it the sightlines in the always-empty bottom tier? No - have you been to Hampden!


I mean my instinctive choice is obviously the San Paolo because of the football passion in Naples. But it's all about those parameters. The old Qemal Stafa in Tirana might have deserved it more than anywhere else in Europe in terms of per-capita "passion".

If I'm only considering Naples because Napoli are such a huge club well then the fact they've never even made the final (far less only winning two scudetti) should work against them. Marseille has that passion and the success in the competition. Plus the Velodrome looks fucking amazing these days.



Is it coz our roof's too wacky for the suits to handle? No - have you been to the Olympiastadion!


I suppose it could be said to be the old Stadium of Light, Lisbon in the 80s when it was the biggest ground in Europe and Benfica's legend was more recent. Though the new one getting it in 2014 makes up for the SFA's Ernie Walker, of the UEFA Stadia Committee famously voting against it because "it didn't have enough lights".



Is it because Ernie Walker's a contrary old tosser? Yes. Yes it is.


If it's about success of the club hosting then why hasn't Anfield ever got it? Liverpool are the only one of the top eight most successful clubs in the history of the competition never to host the final (them and Juventus the only two in the top ten).

And if its about European Cup success of the host city, why did Wembley get it so often when it took London clubs til 2006 to even reach the final? The Heysel staged the final so often yet no Brussels club has ever got to the final?

Perhaps the venue is selected by the on-field European Cup success of the nation in which the final's staged. Well then why Vienna - so often? So very often. And why the Ataturk twice by 2020?

If it's all about a general contribution to European football then what the fuck's the problem with Sweden?



Too late for me. I'm gone. I was good enough for a World Cup final and a Euros semi but club Europe only gave me a Cup-Winners' Cup.
Talk to my Friends about the Europa League ...


Yes, nowadays it's all about infrastructure - hotels, airports and the like - and this, one suspects, is why Čeferin wants to move it to the States. The only question is whether the first one will be in New York or Las fucking Vegas.