The possibility of hosting the competition across up to 13 countriesm was first floated by Michel Platini, the Uefa president, earlier this year following complications with Turkey’s bid and also a desire to ease the financial and logistical demands on one or two host nations.
Platini had announced the Turkish bid as his favoured host last year, a move that discouraged any other serious potential bidders, including England, from entering the contest.
Since then, however, Istanbul has been shortlisted to host the 2020 Olympics, which would effectively rule Turkey out of also hosting the European Championship in the same year.
The idea of a pan-European tournament is also gathering support for other reasons, not least the opportunity it would give for smaller countries to host matches in the competition. Should Uefa decide to trial the idea in 2020 - exactly 60 years after the first European
Championship in 1960 - the Football Association would be expected to strongly campaign for Wembley to host both a semi-final and the final.
Wembley will stage the Champions League final again next year, having previously hosted the showpiece club match of the European season as recently as 2011 when Barcelona beat Manchester United 3-1.
Wolfgang Niersbach, the president of the German Football Association, said that the idea for a pan-European tournament was winning support during consultations with Uefa’s 53 member countries.
"This is the general trend around these meetings that Uefa should do it as an exception on the occasion of celebrating the 60th birthday of the European Championship,” said Niersbach.
A final decision on Euro 2020 is unlikely until next September when the International Olympic Committee decides between Istanbul, Tokyo and Madrid for the Olympics hosts in that same year.
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Source: Telegraph
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