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The final two stadiums for Euro 2004 were inaugurated Tuesday with friendlies against Spanish opposition and firework displays. Boavista's Bessa was only two thirds full, perhaps because the club's fans have grown accustomed to being in it as it was built stand by stand but continued to have games played there. The Estádio Municipal de Braga, on the other hand, where Sporting Braga will play, inaugurated later in the evening, was full of fans wanting to have a first hand look at the most beautiful of the ten stadiums built or revamped for next summer's competition. Built into a hillside quarry, the stadium is indeed magnificent, but as with others built for Euro 2004 (notably Sporting's and FC Porto's), the playing surface was less than perfect, not helped by the constant rain that fell throughout the match. 29/12/03 Tuesday sees the final two official inaugurations of stadiums to be used for Euro 2004. In Porto, Boavista play Málaga at the fully completed Bessa , while later in the evening and a little further north, Sporting Braga face Celta de Vigo in the revolutionary Estádio Municipal de Braga. Alberto Souto, the Mayor of Aveiro, has called upon people of the town to show their indignation at the Germany v Holland group game being trasnsferred to Porto. "I'd like an objective reason to be given for the decision," he said, since it seems that there was never any doubt raised about security for games in the town. UEFA has decided that each federation competing at Euro 2004 will receive at least 20% of the tickets for the games in which they are involved. If one of the federations in a given game asks for less than 20%, the remainder of their share may pass to the other federation involved. In an attempt to restrict the sale of the tickets on the black market,.UEFA also decided that the name of the buyer of the tickets from the federations, who will be allowed a maximum of four, will be printed on the tickets. The Leiria Municipal Assembly voted Thursday to force the City Council to renegotiate the deal struck between the Council and União de Leiria, who will be using the local Estádio Municipal, built to be used at Euro 2004. The deal, dating from November, involves an annual payment to the club by the municipal company in charge of administering the stadium, Leirisport, of up to 1,250,000 euros, as well as exploitation costs (870,000 euros a year), depreciation (500,000 a year), costs of organizing games and taxes on receipts. The Estádio Municipal de Aveiro was inaugurated Thursday with a friendly between local side Beira-Mar (who will be using it for their home games) and Spanish side Osasuna. The game ended 1-1, Muñoz putting Osasuna in front in the second half and Carlinhos levelling. It went to penalties to see who would take the Troféu Mário Duarte - it was Beira-Mar (4-3). The PSD ( Partido Social Democrata) of Braga has challenged the cost of the new Estádio Municipal de Braga, which will be used next summer. The PSD claim that the real cost is in fact over 100 million euros , while the official cost is 83. Even so, the official estimate means that the stadium is by far the costliest per seat of the ten built for the tournament, around 2,700 euros, compared to 1,900 for FC Porto's Estádio do Dragão and 1,800 for Benfica's Luz. 11/12/03 The president of the National Association of Professional Firefighters has criticised safety preparations (or the lack of them) for Euro 2004. Speaking to the Parliamentary Commission set up to monitor work being done for the competition, Fernando Curto said: "There have to be inventories of all existing vehicles, drills in the stadiums, visits to the stadiums, reinforcement of personnel ... things that haven't been done yet ... Ninety per cent of the firefighters are ready to act at the venues, but they don't know the internal plans of emergency and I'm sure that these are not totally ready yet, apart from the fact that there is no articulation between the municipal plans of emergency and those of the stadiums." Meanwhile, António Laranjo, Director of the tournament, told the same Commission that everything was under control and that "the firefighters have been kept informed from the word go." Beira-Mar will inaugurate the Estádio Municipal de Aveiro Thursday with a game against high-flying Osasuna of the Spanish League. The Estádio do Algarve will be properly inaugurated with a friendly between local clubs Farense and Louletano, both of the Segunda B, on January 1st. The stadium was officially inaugurated without a game on November 23rd and will host the Portugal v England friendly on February 18th. The third and final wave of Internet sales of tickets got under way Tuesday. There are just ten games that still have tickets available, and they are: Estádio Mário Duarte (Aveiro): Estádio Municipal Braga: Estádio Algarve (Faro-Loulé): Estádio D. Afonso Henriques (Guimarães):
Estádio Magalhães Pessoa (Leiria) Estádio José Alvalade (Lisbon): Estádio do Dragão (Porto): Estádio do Bessa (Porto): 04/12/03 Portugal's neighbours Spain will be installed in and around Braga,.in the north of Portugal, for the duration of Euro 2004. They will stay at the Hotel da Falperra, in Santa Cristina de Longos, and train at the Estádio 1.º de Maio in Braga, Sporting Braga's home ground until now. The draw for Euro 2004 took place in Lisbon Sunday. Portugal are in the same group as eternal rivals Spain, Greece and Russia. England and France will play each other in the group stage, as will Germany and Holland. The opening game of the tournament will be Portugal v Greece, at Porto's Estádio do Dragão at 17.00 on June 12th, 2004. The groups and positions in the groups look like this:
29/11/03 Sporting Braga will inaugurate the city's new stadium on December 30th with a friendly against Celta de Vigo . The 30,000-seater stadium is unique in that it has stands on only two sides of the pitch and nestles in the side of a hill. 27/11/03 The owners of the Solplay Hotel near Lisbon, which will host the English squad next summer, have denied that it may have to close because of debts to the constructor. The company that runs the hotel had full page ads published in all the major national newspapers Wednesday to explain their position. There had been fears that England might change their choice to a hotel in Spain if this one fell through, which would be a humiliating blow for the organisers. 25/11/03 200 days to go! The Estádio do Algarve was inaugurated Sunday. There was no game played and there was only a simple official opening with fireworks, although an estimated 10,000 were there to witness it. The stadium cost a total of 35 million euros to build and will host its first game on February 18th of next year, a friendly against England. It was the eighth of the ten stadiums to be inaugurated, just leaving those of Braga and Boavista. 21/11/03 Portugal are top of the pots that will dictate the final groups for the Euro 2004. The pots are: A: PORTUGAL, France, Sweden, Czech Republic The draw for the group stages of the tournament will take place on
November 30th. The final five countries to qualify for next summer were found after the second legs of the play-offs Wednesday: Holland
beat Scotland 6-0 after losing the first leg 0-1 in Scotland; Russia, who beat Wales 1-0 in Cardiff after the first leg had been drawn 0-0; Croatia won 1-0 in Slovenia after a 1-1 draw in the first leg;
surprise team Latvia, who drew 2-2 in Turkey after having won the first leg 1-0; and Spain, who waltzed past Norway 3-0 in Oslo after scraping a 2-1 win in
Spain. While the Portuguese organisers will be breathing a huge sigh of relief that Spain got through, so important was their contribution going to be in terms of bums
on seats, they will be disappointed in the other three results: Latvia will bring few fans, Russia also, and while the Dutch normally have a good following, they also
have a dangerous hooligan element. The Scots have huge support and have proved harmless on the recent trips of their clubs to Portugal and Seville (for the UEFA
Cup final). In footballing terms, Holland will be the more welcome of the two sides. The final 16, then: FPF president Gilberto Madaíl said Monday that a few months ago there had
been a risk that Euro 2004 would not be played in Portugal given the doubts about the country's ability to pull it off. "I personally had quite a job at an international
level to get UEFA to keep Euro 2004 in Portugal," he told radio station Antena 1. "Things got to a point where there was already a country, and it wasn't Spain, that
was absolutely ready to take on the organisation of Euro 2004 if Portugal failed." The five play-offs for the competition are finely balanced after the first legs.
Despite historic rivalry with the Spanish, the Portuguese, at least the organisers of the competition, are hoping for an aggregate win for Spain over Norway, given the
revenue that would be lost should neighbours Spain not qualify. The results of the first legs were: Spain 2-1 Norway Three Euro 2004 stadiums will be inaugurated in the next ten days. On Sunday, FC Porto play Barcelona in a friendly at the Estádio do Dragão ('Stadium of the Dragon' - Porto's nickname). On November 15th, the Aveiro Municipal Stadium will be the venue for a Portugal v Greece friendly, and on November 19th it will be the turn of the Leiria Municipal Stadium to host Portugal v Kuwait in another friendly to prepare the Selecção for next summer. 05/11/03 The Euro 2004 trophy will be on show in Lisbon on November 8th and 9th at the Lisbon branch of the Spanish Department Store chain, El Corte Inglês. The Parliamentary Committee set up to monitor the progress of the stadiums for Euro 2004 will discuss November 11th and 12th the question of the Estádio D. Afonso Henriques in Guimarães. Doubts have arisen as to who is the rightful owner of the stadium, the local city council or the club Vitória de Guimarães. 02/11/03 The Secretary of State for Health, Carlos Martins, told Portuguese press agency Lusa Saturday that Portugal had acquired a quantity of smallpox vaccinations to meet a possible terrorist bio-attack at Euro 2004. The actual quantity was not revealed, but it would be enough only to treat those who came into contact with the disease. 01/11/03 A worker died Friday when he fell 15 metres while working on the Aveiro Municipal Stadium. They are putting the finishing touches to a stadium that will be inaugurated November 15th with the friendly Portugal v Greece. 22/10/03 The Aveiro Municipal Council , ultimately responsible for the Municipal Stadium which will be used for Euro 2004, have denied rumours that there is a 'structural problem' with the stadium that would keep it from being inaugurated as scheduled on November 15th with the friendly between Portugal and Greece. 16/10/03 The visit of Ernie Walker, head of the UEFA Stadiums Commission, for yet another check on the Euro 2004 Stadiums, was an opportunity for the Portuguese Football Federation to announce that the friendly against England on February 18th will take place at the Algarve Stadium , located between Faro and Loulé. 15/10/03 Germany, who qualified directly from the group phase, have already booked their hotel in the Algarve, in the south of Portugal. They have reserved 109 rooms in the luxury Ria Park Garden, which has adjoining sports facilities. The most important aspect of the draw for the play-offs to Euro 2004 for the Portuguese - and for the financial success of the tournament - was who Spain would get. It's vital that they qualify for economic reasons - half of the visitors to Portugal will be Spanish if they qualify. In the event, it could have been worse - the Spanish got Norway, and they will be welcoming that draw rather than Holland or Turkey, for example. The whole draw is as follows, to be played on the 15th (16th) and 18th (19th) November. Latvia-Turkey 12/10/03 The picture of who'll be playing in Portugal next summer came a little more into focus Saturday with the last of the qualifying group games. Denmark, Switzerland, Greece, Germany, England, Italy all secured a place in the finals, while in the respective groups Norway, Russia, Spain, Scotland, Turkey and Wales all confirmed a play-off place, along with Latvia, Slovenia, Holland and Croatia. Definitely out , perhaps surprisingly, are the Republic of Ireland, Romania, Poland, Hungary and Belgium. The eleven countries definitely qualified so far, then, are: Portugal, France, the Czech Republic, Sweden, Bulgaria, Denmark, Switzerland, Greece, Germany and England. 30/09/03 The Municipal Stadium at Aveiro was officially completed Monday, the fourth of ten Euro 2004 stadiums to be operational. The 31,200-seater stadium, which will be used by SuperLiga side Beira-Mar, cost 46 million euros to build from scratch and joins Coimbra, Alvalade XXI (Sporting, also from scratch) and Guimarães on the list of completed stadiums. 27/09/03 The Euro 2004 organisers have sent a mail-shot to every household in Portugal to coincide with a nationwide publicity campaign to generate interest in the competition amongst the Portuguese. The mail-shot was a letter from National Team Coach Felipe Scolari: "Dear Friends, We're entering the final phase of UEFA EURO 2004, the most important sporting event ever to take place in Portugal. 20/09/03 Benfica hope to inaugurate their new Luz stadium on October 25th. Marítimo have agreed to postpone the game they were to play against Benfica in Madeira on the same weekend. The opponents for the inauguration have yet to be announced, but the club is hoping to get either real Madrid or AC Milan. FC Porto's Estádio do Dragão will be inaugurated with a friendly match on November 16th, "pitch permitting", according to club president Pinto da Costa. UEFA decided Thursday that Portugal will be one of the seeds at the November draw for the EURO 2004 Finals. The other definite seed will be France, and the two others from 14 will be the teams with the best performance coefficient. UEFA's Executive Committee decided in Bratislava Wednesday that the play-offs for qualification to EURO 2004 will not be seeded. The Associação Sindical dos Profissionais da Polícia (ASPP) (Police Union) warned Wednesday that 3,000 extra officers would be needed for EURO 2004, apart from the 900 new officers who will be receiving training as from this month. 17/09/03 Ten billion TV viewers are predicted for EURO 2004, three billion more than in 2000, according to EBS (European Broadcasting Service), comprising the State TV and radio stations RTP and RDP. Each of the 31 games at EURO 2004 will be covered by at least 19 cameras. UEFA's Executive Committee will be discussing Wednesday and Thursday the basis on which the play-offs for EURO 2004 will be played. The question is: will there be seeds (this time) or no seeds (as in 2000). 16/09/03 FPF president Gilberto Madaíl said Monday that between 70 and 75% of the tickets available for EURO 2004 have been taken up, and he expects that to rise to 100% by the end of the year. Over 270,000 were sold in the first phase, up until June 16th, and another 140,000 are available until November 24th. The Coimbra Municipal Stadium will be inaugurated Friday evening. The 30,000-seater stadium will be used for three games at EURO 2004 and will also be used by local club Académica, currently of the SuperLiga. The Rolling Stones will play there on September 27th. It is the third EURO 2004 stadium to be fully functional after Sporting's Alvalade XXI and Vitória de Guimarães' Estádio D. Afonso Henriques , although the latter has had some problems with its licence. A Portuguese tradition at football stadiums, and one which will be very difficult to eradicate, is that of an adult being able to take in children without tickets. This has already caused some problems at recent games, notably the international against Kazakhstan and the SuperTaça between FC Porto and União de Leiria. The organisers of the tournament are considering printing the warning on tickets that children will not be allowed into games without a ticket. The organisers are still recruiting volunteers to help with the running of the tournament. They have 4,300 already, of a projected need for 5,000, but they want to recruit more to be on the safe side. Of all the areas involved, the Algarve is the slowest getting off the ground in this respect. Five teams have now qualified for the EURO 2004 finals: Portugal, of course, as hosts, and after Wednesday's results, France, the Czech Republic, Sweden and Bulgaria . Other teams are in a great position to qualify directly, with just one game left in each group, notably England, Italy and Germany who all now head their respective groups. Neighbours Spain , the team that the organisers most want to qualify from an economic point of view because they will bring many visitors to the country, struggled to beat the Ukraine 2-1 and still trail Greece in their group. The Parliamentary Group that is monitoring preparations for the competition, notably the progress of the new stadiums, will hear the Secretary of State for Sport Hermínio Loureiro and the president of the FPF Gilberto Madaíl on the subject of Vitória de Guimarães' D. Afonso Henriques stadium. Irregularities have emerged concerning the licence for the stadium, creating doubts over whether it can be used for the competition. 09/09/03 Five national teams will be able to stamp their tickets Wednesday for EURO 2004. France need only to draw with Slovenia, while Denmark, Sweden, Switzerland and the Czech Republic have only to win to guarantee qualification. 04/09/03 Ernie Walker and his stadium inspectors are back in Portugal for yet another round of the ten stadiums to be used for Euro 2004. On Tuesday they visited the Stadium of the Algarve in the south, and on Wednesday Benfica's and Sporting's stadiums in Lisbon and Leiria's in the centre. The only question mark seems to be over the Municipal Stadium in Leiria ; UEFA need to be certain that it will be completed by September 30th, the deadline. 09/08/03 Football magazine Doze ('Twelve') suggested this week that UEFA were considering discarding two of the stadiums lined up for EURO 2004 to make it eight to be used. Apparently, five miilion euros could be saved per stadium in operational costs alone. However, FPF president Gilberto Madaíl was quick to refute the possibility. Chairman of the UEFA Stadiums Committee, Ernie Walker, returns to Portugal at the beginning of September for yet another inspection of the stadiums to be used. 05/08/03 A further 15,000 tickets were sold over the weekend in the second phase of ticketing for EURO 2004. There are now only 95,000 left. 02/08/03 30,000 tickets were sold in the first six hours of the second phase of ticketing for the EURO 2004 tournament Friday. The phase continues until November 24th. The semi-finals and final are already sold out. The second phase of ticket sales for EURO 2004 swings into action Friday. 270,000 tickets have already been sold from applications for 500,000, and another 130,000 now go on sale. "Sales have been an enormous success," said FPF president Gilberto Madaíl. (See www.euro2004.com) 24/07/03 Boavista president João Loureiro said Wednesday that the Bessa stadium in Oporto is in danger of being left out of EURO 2004 because of the time being taken by the city council to OK the construction of access roads near the ground. 22/07/03 UEFA and Adidas have signed a deal for the sports firm to supply equipment, kits and balls for next year's competition. 19/07/03 The Parliamentary Committee accompanying the construction/ works on the stadiums to be used at Euro 2004 has voiced its concern that Boavista's Bessa Stadium may be deficient in terms of access. An access road near the stadium, in the built up western side of the the city of Oporto, has yet to gain full planning permission from the City Council and is only forecast for completion in April 2004, just two months before the start of the competition. 11/07/03 Portuguese fashion designer Isilda Pelicano has been awarded the contract to create the 'uniforms' of Portuguese players and officials at Euro 2004, it was announced Thursday. the clothes will be made with Portuguese materials and will be in tones of brown, to match the Euro 2004 logo and to escape from the normal grey. 21/06/03 The first phase of the sales of tickets for Euro 2004 ended on Monday, with over half a million reservations made, 40% of them from Portugal. Some games have been over subscribed already and will go to a draw to see who gets the tickets. The next phase begins in August when the organisers will reveal which games still have tickets available. In this next phase, sales will be on a first-come-first-served basis. A Director of União de Leiria , Vasco Pinto Leite, said Wednesday that the club has renewed its protocol with the local council of nearby town Marinha Grande to use their municipal stadium for its games next season, this despite the fact that a new 30,000-seater stadium is being built in Leiria for Euro 2004. According to Pinto Leite, Leirisport, the public company in charge of the administration of the Leiria stadium (Estádio Dr. Magalhães Pessoa), is asking an exhorbitant rent to use the stadium. Ernie Walker and the UEFA inspectors visited the stadiums in Coimbra, Aveiro and Oporto (FC Porto) Wednesday. He was, as ever, upbeat, but it seems that the Aveiro stadium is running a little behind. It should be ready in time, though, Walker believes. 18/06/03 UEFA's Ernie Walker is in Portugal again to cast an eye over the stadiums to be used in the tournament. Tuesday he visited the Stadium of the Algarve, Alvalade XXI (Sporting) and the new Luz (Benfica). He seemed generally satisfied with progress on all three, and said of the 65,000-seater Luz : "This stadium is world class, worthy of a final of the Champions League." 14/06/03 As from Thursday 12/06/03, there is exactly one year left to the start of the biggest sporting event ever staged in Portugal: The EURO 2004 Championship. Ernie Walker and the UEFA Stadium inspectors will be back between June 17th and 19th to visit nine of the ten stadiums for Euro 2004. They will not visit Vitória de Guimarães stadium as it is more or less fully completed. 29/05/03 FPF president Gilberto Madaíl said Wednesday that there is not need to worry about delays in the construction of the Euro 2004 stadiums, namely those at Aveiro, Braga and Leiria (see below), since they will still be ready by September, within UEFA's requirements. Meanwhile, the company responsible for the Municipal Stadium of Leiria, Leirisport, has denied that there are any delays. José Luís Arnaut , the Under-Minister responsible for Euro 2004, has revealed that three of the stadiums to be used are way behind schedule to the tune of ten, four and ten weeks respectively: Aveiro, Leiria and Braga . 10/05/03 The inauguration of the Estádio Municipal de Coimbra, originally intended for July 4th, will probably be pushed back because of delays in the completion of the commercial and residential complex surrounding it, the City Council announced Wednesday. After Euro 2004, the stadium will be the home of Académica. Over 100,000 tickets for Euro 2004 have been sold on the Internet in just one week. There were 23,000 requests for tickets, England, Holland and Germany leading the charge. The Portuguese have reserved 24% of the tickets, not counting those ordered at post offices. 30/04/03 For seven weeks until June 16th, 450,000 tickets (from a total of 1,200m) will be made available over the Internet and elsewhere for the finals of Euro 2004. The prices of tickets vary between 35 euros and 270. Addressing the home market, FPF president Gilberto Madaíl appealed to the Portuguese to "not leave everything till the last minute" (a reputation they have). Some of the main points with respect to tickets are the following: - There is a
Follow My Team module, where you can reserve a ticket for all the games your team will play in, with the chance to get a refund if they do not play in
all the games foreseen. this can only be booked on the Internet; FC Porto's Antas Stadium (Opening match and semi-final of Euro 2004) will not be completed until October 2003, a month later than expected, Vice-president of the club Angelino Ferreira said Thursday. The delay is down to problems with access and the fact that work was halted for 32 days last year following a dispute with the City Council. (A Bola On-line) 17/04/03 Tickets for Euro 2004 will be on sale on the Internet as from April 28th, UEFA announced in Nyon, Switzerland Wednesday. Internet sales will end on June 16th. Over half a million tickets will be made available to the general public 12/04/03 Portuguese group Soporcel/Portucel, manufacturers of paper products, and more specifically their brand of printing paper Navigator, are the latest sponsor of Euro 2004. Meanwhile, the tournament mascot Kinas is under attack once again, this time by the Partido Socialista, who said the name: "tramples on the dignity of the Portuguese language and nacional symbols." Kinas is a corruption of the Portuguese Quinas , the little blue shields on the national flag. The president of the FPF, Gilberto Madaíl, said Wednesday (to SportTV) that despite slight delays here and there, everything is on course in terms of preparations for Euro 2004. Meanwhie, Braga City Council has had to extend more money to the builders of the municipal stadium there, which has gone 7.5 % over budget. 01/04/03 Ernie Walker and his UEFA Stadiums Commission will be returning to Portugal at the end of June for yet an other inspection of the ten stadiums to be used for the finals of Euro 2004. 31/03/03 The official euro2004 mascot Kinas was presented to the public Saturday. He is different from many mascots of recent euros in that he is supposed to be human and not animal: "He's a little boy who was born in a Portuguese village and who loves playing football. like any youngster of his age, he's fun and irreverent ..." But Kinas almost didn't see the light of day. The company Swedish Match, owner of the brand name Quinas, threatened legal action against the use of the name. But it seems the constestation has burnt out ... for now. 29/03/03 The official euro2004 web site will be launched Saturday, hopefully clarifying some of the confusion existing about information like ticketing. The address is www.euro2004.com. The Euro 2004 mascot will be officially unveiled at the Portugal v Brazil friendly Saturday. the mascot is called Kinas; the Portuguese team is nicknamed A Selecção das Quinas (the small blue shields on the Portuguese flag). The president of the RTRL, a regional tourism organisation, has warned that Aveiro does not have enough hotel beds for the two group games that will be played in the city. There are currently around 3,000 but Encarnação Dias says that the ideal number would be nearer 16,000. 27/03/03 The Executive Committee of UEFA , meeting in Rome, said Wednesday that they had received favourable reports on the progress of proparations for the Euro 2004 Championship. 'There is a small delay in one or two stadiums, but that will be sorted out soon," said Lennart Johansson. 22/03/03 The UEFA Executive Committee will meet next Tuesday and Wednesday in Rome to discuss progress on the Euro 2004 project. There will be a press conference Wednesday to summarise their findings. 15/03/03 The UEFA Stadiums Commission completed its tour of the ten stadiums Friday with a visit to the Braga municipal stadium. This stadium will be, in the words of the head of the Commission Ernie Walker, "unique in the world". It will have a capacity of thirty thousand, all seated on two sides of the ground. It is built into the side of a hill, and the rocky end will hold a video screen that will be the largest of its kind in Europe: 30 metres wide and nine deep. The tour went off without a hitch, except for some doubts being cast over access to the stadiums (roads and transport). There was one piece of good news in this respect Friday. Valentim Loureiro, in charge of the Porto Metro, confirmed that the 1.2 km stretch of the system from the mainline station of Campanhã to the Antas stadium will be competed in time for the tournament. The inspectors will be back in June. 13/03/03 The UEFA Stadiums Commission, headed by Scotsman Ernie Walker , is once again in Portugal to inspect the ten stadiums being built or upgraded. The Estádio do Algarve was first on the list Wednesday, followed by Alvalade and the Luz. So far Walker seems to be impressed, but has mentioned a worry about access to the stadiums, still a bone of contention between clubs and local councils. Thursday the Commission visits the stadiums in Leira, Coimbra, Aveiro and the Antas in Porto, then on Friday, the Bessa in Porto, Braga and Guimarães. 12/03/03 Reservations of tickets for Euro 2004 can be made on the Internet as from April 28th, it was announced Tuesday. Four hundred thousand tickets will be made available in the first wave, with people allowed a maximum of four each. (See UEFA site) Those responsible for the ten stadiums to be used signed contracts Monday ceding the stadiums to UEFA for the duration of the tournament. UEFA will pay a total of 17 million euros for the use of the stadiums. 10/03/03 The Portuguese were surprised Sunday with the image of José Camacho, Spanish coach of Benfica, being on the front cover of a brochure supposedly promoting Euro 2004 in Portugal, launched at a trade fair in Berlin. 08/03/03 Sports daily A Bola suggested Friday the number of games to be played in each of the venues of Euro 2004. The opening game will be at the Antas (FC Porto) on June 16th, the Final at the Luz (Benfica) on July 4th. (See Stadiums) Ernie Walker and his inspection team will be back to check up on the stadiums between March 12th and 14th. On the 12th they'll visit the Algarve stadium, the Luz and Alvalade (Lisbon); on March 14th they'll visit Leiria, Coimbra and Aveiro; and on March 14th, they'll move north to see the antas, Bessa, Guimarães and Braga. The Portuguese Government are practically sure to suspend the Schengen agreement for the duration of the tournament. This will mean that the border with Spain will once again be controlled by customs and security officials. Portugal is preparing to re-recruit 200 border guards for the event. (A Bola) 04/03/03 The draw for the finals of Euro 2004 will take place in the Pavilhão Atlântico in Lisbon at 11.00 on Sunday, November 30th, 2003. The 'Pavillion', which is on the eastern side of Lisbon, was the centre-piece of the World Fair Expo'98. The final teams to be qualified will be known after the play-offs of November 16th and 19th. 01/03/03 The official mascot for Euro 2004 will be unveiled at the Portugal v Brazil friendly, to be played in Oporto on March 29th. The car make Hyundai has joined the list of official sponsors of the competition 28/02/03 The Parliamentary Commission that is looking into progress being made on the ten stadiums that will host the Euro 2004 champoinship is worried about access to them, chairman of the Commission Laurentino Dias said Thursday. Of special concern are the Antas (FC Porto), Bessa (Boavista) and Luz (Benfica) Stadiums. With regard to the latter, there has not even been a protocol signed yet between club, Lisbon City Council and Government. "At this moment, we need to break the national sprint record to get the protocol signed, the bids for the job in and the work finished in time for the start of the Championship, which is going to be very, very difficult," said Dias. 27/02/03 The Portuguese government will spend almost 80 million euros just on access to the ten stadiums being prepared for the competition. Eleven million will be for Benfica's Luz stadium alone, Vasco Lynce, president of Portugal2004, the company in charge of the local administration of preparations, revealed Wednesday. Meanwhile, according to the Portuguese news agency Lusa, work on Metro (underground) access to the New Antas stadium in Oporto can get started relatively shortly if bureaucratic hold-ups are unblocked. If there is not much more delay, the route can be finished by May 2004. 26/02/03 Work to upgrade Francisco Sá Carneiro, the airport that serves Oporto, will not now be completed in time for Euro 2004, it was revealed Tuesday by the chairman of the Portuguese Airports Authority. Work to double the airport's capacity from three to six million passengers a year was originally set to end in the middle of 2003, now the end of 2004. The airport is in Maia, 17 kms from Oporto. 25/02/03 The president of the Porto Metro, Valentim Loureiro, who is also president of the Liga, said Monday that the underground connection between the main station of Campanhã in the south-east of the city and the new Antas Stadium in the east would only be ready by May of next year, and that only if the Government takes action immediately . The link is thought vital for access to the 52,000-seater Antas, one of the major stadiums to be used at Euro 2004 - it will hold the opening match and one of the semi-finals. 24/02/03 The Under-17 European Championship, to be held in Viseu and Vila Real in May, will be used as a dummy run for some of the elements of Euro 2004, namely the question of stewards, volunteers and television coverage. Eurosport will televise nine games, while Portuguese state channel RTP will cover Portugal's games, the semi-finals and the final. 19/02/03 Galp , the State-run oil and gas company, is the second national sponsor of the competition after the Post Office (CTT). There will be four other national sponsors, yet to be announced. 14/02/03 Euro 2004 has a new sponsor. Mathieu Spreners, a member of the Executive Committe of UEFA announced in Tokyo Thursday that NTT/VERIO will be lending is name to the tournament. The company is already sponsoring the UEFA Cup Final. 07/02/03 The Estádio do Algarve will be inaugurated with a game involving the National Team, FPF president Gilberto Madaíl announced Friday. The exact date and the oppositon are yet to be revealed, but the stadium is due to be inaugurated any time between June and August of this year. 06/02/03 Lisbon Mayor Pedro Santana Lopes
, former president of Sporting, criticised Wednesday the delay in beginning the campaign to promote Euro 2004: "I think it's surreal what's happened with the promotion of Euro 2004
... At this point, everything should have been done. Germany is already promoting the 2006 World Cup. We should have started in 2001, but c'est le Portugal.". Former international referee, Vítor Pereria
, who took part in the last World Cup, has been appointed Refereeing Coordinator for Euro 2004. He is currently a member of UEFA's Refereeing Commission. 04/02/03 Sports Minister José Luís Arnaut met separately with the presidents of the Quatro Grandes (Benfica, FC Porto, Sporting and Boavista) Monday to discuss security procedures that will be needed in and around the stadiums during Euro 2004. Meanwhile, Boavista made known in a press release their discontent at what they see as favouritism towards FC Porto by the Porto City Council with respect to land ceded to the clubs for work on their respective stadiums, both of which are to be used during the tournament. 02/02/03 Television presenter Carlos Cruz, at the helm of Portugal's successful bid for Euro 2004, has been arrested in connection with the nationwide paedophilia scandal involving the Casa Pia , a chartiable institution for orphans. 30/01/03 FPF 28/01/03 (II) Tickets for the group games at Euro 2004 will not cost less than 50 euros, and
will cost more for the opening game and the quarter and semi-finals. Fans will have to find around 250 euros if they want to watch the final. (Diário de Notícias)
Wednesday will mark the beginning of the countdown to Euro 2004, with just 500 days left until the opening game, at the Antas in Oporto. FPF president Gilberto Madaíl
will name the 28 training camps to be used during the tournament. The first pieces of Euro 2004 merchandise are beginning to appear, including stickers with the competition's slogan: LIVE 4 IT!
Socialist MP Fernando Gomes has expressed worries about the fact that the new aiport that will serve Oporto, Aveiro, Braga and Guimarães (five Euro 2004
stadiums in all) will not be ready in time for the tournament since work on it is already 18 months behind schedule. This will mean that the existing Sá Carneiro airport will have to serve. (A Bola On-line)
27/01/03 UEFA's Gerhard Aigner announced in Nyon, Switzerland Monday that the Euro 2004 tournament will have another sponsor, this time the photography giant Canon
. Other official sponsors are Carlsberg, McDonald's, Coca-Cola and JVC, while the Portuguese postal service CTT is a national partner. 21/01/03 Boavista have arranged a loan of 15 million euros to finish off the new Bessa stadium. The loan will be repaid over ten years. The total cost of 40 million euros will thus be met by 15 million of Boavista's own capital, ten million from the state and these 15 million privately sourced. The new Bessa will be inaugurated in August to mark the 100th birthday of the club. It is one of the ten stadiums that will be used for Euro 2004. 27/12/02
Home Secretary 07/12/02 CTT, the Portuguese Post Office, became the first Portuguese partner
for the EURO 2004 championship. CTT will issue a range of philatelic products, like stamps and postcards, to commemorate the event. 05/12/02 Ernie Walker and the UEFA
stadium inspectors compelted their most recent round of visits to the ten stadiums to be used at EURO 2004. Once again, Walker was relatively happy with what he saw: "I'm covered in mud from my feet to my
knees, I got rain and fog, but I'm satisfied with what I saw," he said after a day visiting FC Porto's Antas and the stadiums of Braga and Guimarães, all in the north.
The next visit will be in February of next year. 14/11/02 Vasco Lynce, head of the domestic organizing body Sociedade Euro-2004, said Wednesday that Benfica
cannot receive any of the State subsidies it is due for its new Luz stadium until it submits certificates proving the regualrization of its tax and social security debts. 08/11/02
Only half of the ten stadiums lined up for EURO 2004 have so far received any money from the State: Boavista's Bessa, Sporting's Alvalade XXI, FC Porto's Antas, the Municipal Stadium of Aveiro
(Beira-Mar) and the Stadium of the Algarve. The Bessa is by far and away the greatest beneficiary so far, but it is also the stadium nearest completion. It has received a contribution of 5.36 million euros
towards the total spent of 31.98 million. The final cost is expected to be 40.69 million. Five other stadiums have not received anything yet, mainly because of bureaucratic obstacles: Benfica's Luz, Braga,
Guimarães, Coimbra and Leiria. (A Bola On-line) 07/11/02 Warner Bros. Consumer Products have won from UEFA the licence to be exclusively responsible for the marketing
of products related to the EURO 2004 championship. Among other things, the company will be responsible for creating the EURO 2004 mascot. UEFA
explained Wednesday that the theme song to be composed by Phil Collins will be the general theme, valid for all Euros from 2004 on, but that each competition will have its own theme, produced locally.
06/11/02 The british singer/songwriter Phil Collins will compose the theme song for EURO 2004, UEFA announced Wednesday. The decision has been met with discomfort
in some quarters in Portugal; the Portuguese were not even consulted in the decision, and the song is not likely to reflect Portuguese culture or tradition.
Popular singer Pedro Abrunhosa called the choice "an insult". 29/10/02 The Parliamentary Commission set up to accompany the organisation of the
EURO 2004 Championship said Monday that it was worried about FC Porto's new Antas Stadium. Work on the stadium itself is proceeding well, but work on
access routes to the stadium is encountering problems: "It would be unbelievable for the stadium to be ready and there to be no way of getting to it," said the head of the Commission, Laurentino Dias
, a Socialist Deputy. 23/10/02 Prime Minister Durão Barroso told Parliament (A Assembleia Geral) Tuesday that his Government was committed to seeing through the EURO 2004
Championship, but he said: "If I had been Prime Minister [at the time], there would be no EURO 2004 in Portugal." 18/10/02 Thursday was the day for the UEFA Commission
to inspect the stadiums in Leiria and Lisbon (Sporting and Benfica). While Ernie Walker seemed impressed with the progress of the Lisbon stadiums (confirming that Sporting's
Alvalade XXI will be important for the tournament), he seemed less pleased with Leiria's, putting a question mark over the possibility of the stadium being finished in time. 17/10/02 Ernie Walker
and the Stadium Commission continued their tour of the EURO 2004 stadiums Wednesday. They started in Oporto at Boavista's Bessa and FC Porto's new Antas stadium, moving on to the Estádio de Aveiro
where the Commission was pleasantly surprised: "At the beginning I was sceptical, I didn't believe that it was possible, but it's progressing within the foreseen time and budget.
we have no doubts that Aveiro will have an important part to play in EURO 2004." In Coimbra, Walker was asked how many games the Municipal Stadium would host. "At least two," he said.
Some of the more striking results of the Euro 2004 qualifiers played Wednesday were: Luxembourg 0-7 Romania 16/10/02 Walker will submit his report on the latest visit to UEFA next week, and it should
then be known if any of the stadiums will be left out of the reckoning. It has been suggested that the tournament could go ahead with as few as six stadiums. 13/10/02
Some of the more interesting scores from Saturday in group qualifying games for EURO 2004: 11/10/02 Work on Benfica's new stadium will recommence Friday. There has been a
stoppage of two days while problems of a debt to the constructors were ironed out. The UEFA Stadiums Commission will be back in Portugal between October
15th and 18th for yet another inspection of the ten grounds to be used at EURO 2004. The tour starts in the North with the Estádio Municipal de Braga and ends in the South with the Estádio do Algarve
. 09/10/02 Work on Benfica's new Luz stadium was suspended Tuesday. There were several theories as to why. There have been heavy rains in Portugal over the last two
days, which was one of the reasons given by Benfica directors, but there were also rumours that there has been a hitch in the financing plan because of a delay in
official documents coming out of Lisbon City Council offices. (A Bola On-line) 27/09/02 26/09/02 The expected impact of the EURO 2004
competition on various aspects of Portuguese life will be debated in Parliament on October 7th. The presidents of the FPF and Liga, Gilberto Madaíl and Valentim Loureiro, will talk about the
sporting aspects, while in the afternoon, socio-economic considerations will be discussed. (infordesporto ) 13/09/02 The Portuguese Stadiums Association (APE) said Thursday that the ten
stadiums to be used in the EURO 2004 tournament should be ready by the UEFA deadline of September 2003, and in some cases before. The Association
reiterated the importance of having a season's run-up to the competition, in which all aspects of the stadiums' use will be tested, and it revealed that the Sociedade EURO 2004
wants to stage a mini-tournament in the stadiums during the 2003-2004 season. (infordesporto) 12/09/02 The Secretary of State for Public Works
, Vieira de Castro, has told the Parliamentary Commission that is accompanying the EURO 2004 project how much it is going to cost to build/ improve access routes to the stadiums to be used
in the competition. The State is going to have to fork out 68.3 million euros to create adequate access to nine of the ten stadiums planned for EURO 2004. This
value does not include access to Benfica's Luz stadium which may cost as much as 10 million . The values for each stadium are as follows: FC Porto (20 million
euros), Sporting (10.9), Coimbra (9.6), Leiria (5.9), Aveiro (5.2), Guimarães (5.2), Faro/Loulé (4.1), Boavista (3.5) and Braga (3.3). To compensate for the expected increase in air traffic, the Governemnt has said
that it may have to re-think the current prohibition of take-offs and landings at the airports of Lisbon and Porto between 24.00 and 06.00.
The Secretary of State for Health, Carlos Martins, told the Commission that no new hospitals are to be built to coincide with the tournament, but that the
emergency network will be reinforced, involving increased investment in equipment, facilities, staff and ambulances. (infordesporto) Reports on the progress of preparations for EURO 2004
will be top of the agenda when the Executive Committee of UEFA meets in Istanbul on September 18th/19th. (A Bola On-line) 10/09/02 FC Porto
spokesman Angelino Ferreira said Monday that work on the new Antas Stadium, to be used at EURO 2004, will be completed at the end of September 2003
, a little later than originally planned. Work has been set back due to a disagreement with the City Council about the degree of devlopment around the stadium. (A Bola On-line) 08/09/02 Qualifying
games for EURO 2004 got under way on Saturday. Some of the shocks and semi-shocks were the following: Group 4: Latvia 0-0 Sweden 04/09/02 All the ten local councils or clubs committed to building or improving stadiums to
be used at EURO 2004 have given a firm promise to the Government that their venues will be ready in time for the competition, and within budget. The
Government has meanwhile warned once again that it can contribute no more money to the projects, other than that already agreed. 02/09/02
In the match programme of the Sporting v Santa Clara game on September 1st, it was confirmed that Sporting will be able to stay at Alvalade until the end of the
season. It was thought that they may have to move out to another stadium for some games owing to work on the new stadium, being built next to the existing one for EURO 2004
. Work has begun already, however: all the seats have been removed from half of the West Stand and a section behind the goal of the South Stand, in readiness for demolition work. The new Alvalade XXI can already be seen
peeking over the top of the West Stand. 30/08/02 The possibility of the construction workers who are building the stadiums for
EURO 2004 going on strike is still in the air. The president of the Northern Construction Workers Union, a branch of ther national union CGTP, Albano
Ribeiro, said Thursday that next Tuesday (03/09) there will be a meeting to discuss action to be taken in the light of the difficulties encountered in satisfying the union's 29/08/02 Director of Operations
for the final phase of EURO 2004, Michael Kallen, said Wednesday that all the games will be available on terrestrial television, which means that State Channel RTP
will have the rights in Portugal. Michael Kallen, Swiss, was presented as the Director of Operations to act as a link between Portugal and UEFA. (A Bola On-line) The construction unions have once again threatened to stop work on the EURO 2004 stadiums in September if they don't receive an increase in overtime rates and meal subsidies
. This would seriously jeopardise the schedule for the construction of the stadiums, already hard pushed. (A Bola On-line) 21/08/02 Responding to an appeal by
Liga president Valentim Loureiro for more funds, the Government today declared that they will not give a single extra euro towards
the building of the stadiums for EURO 2004. "There will be no additional direct of indirect support, through finanical subsidies or other means, beyond what was
signed for by the previous [Socialist] Government ... the difficulties that the country is going through prevent any type of additional support," said Minister for Sport José Luís Arnault
. He added that an audit of the EURO 2004 accounts will begin as from September 30th. 15/08/02 The UEFA Stadiums Commission visited the Faro/ Loulé Municipal Stadium on
Wednesday and declared themselves satisfied with the progress, compared to the last visit in May. Earlier in the day, the group, headed by On Tuesday, the Commission had visited the two stadiums in Oporto, Boavista's and FC Porto's, and União de Leiria's.
13/08/02 The UEFA Stadiums Commission, headed by Ernie Walker, is visiting Portugal to inspect the grounds to be used at EURO 2004. They visited the stadiums in the North of Portugal, specifically
Vitória de Guimarães' (modified) and Sporting Braga's (new) Monday and the verdict was one of satisfaction at the progress achieved, despite some geological problems with the one in Braga. Ernie Walker
announced that this will be the last inspection trip by the Commission before a report is sent to the Executive Committee in September. A decision will be made at
the end of the year on which stadiums, if any, will not the make the cut. ( infordesporto) 08/08/02 A Sociedade EURO 2004
, the organising body for the competition, announced Wednesday that tickets for EURO 2004 will be available at the beginning of next
year via the Internet and the football associations/federations of each country. Exact procedures for the acquisition of tickets will be announced then. ( A Bola On-line) The team of inspectors
of the EURO 2004 stadiums, led by Ernie Walker, will pay another of their regular visits to Portugal next week. The inspections start on
Monday in the North (Braga and Guimarães). On Tuesday they visit Boavista and FC Porto (Oporto) and the municipal stadiums of Aveiro, Coimbra and Leiria in
the Centre of the country. The trip ends on Wednesday at Benfica and Sporting (Lisbon) and the intermunicipal stadium of Faro/ Loulé in the Algarve. (A Bola On-line) 07/08/02 A strike
by civil construction workers is on the cards if six demands "to dignify their work and the profession" (president of the Northern union Albano Ribeiro)
are not met. A September strike, if called, would seriously jeopardise work on the EURO 2004 stadiums. (A Bola On-line) 03/08/02 The Professional Training Centre for the Food Sector
has presented FC Porto with a scale model of the Estádio das Antas. It took four pastry chefs 150 hours to make the model, which FC Porto president Pinto da Costa described as
"a work of art". The Centre is to make similar models of all the stadiums that will be demolished ahead of EURO 2004. (infordesporto) 26/07/02 Sporting
told the Parliamentary Commission set up to control the preparations for EURO 2004 that a quarter of the old Alvalade stadium will have to be demolished between September and October to make way for the new
Estádio Alvalade Século XXI. they also revealed that the whole stadium complex will finally cost 137 million euros, and that Sporting will pay back over ten years the bank loans
taken out to finance their part of the bill. (A Bola On-line) 25/07/02 Federation president Gilberto Madaíl said Wednesday that the Selecção
will be based in Lisbon during EURO 2004. He also announced that the first 450,000 tickets for the competition will go on sale on the Internet in February 2003. (A Bola On-line) The Commission
to inspect the stadiums to be used at EURO 2004 were told Wednesday that construction on Sporting Braga's new stadium is running two
weeks late, but it praised the adventurous nature of the project (the ground will have spectators only on the two sides). The cost of the project has more than doubled from the original estimate to 13 million euros. (
infordesporto) 09/07/02 Leiria City Council has applied for a bank loan (from the Dexia Public Finance Bank) of 12.5 million Euros, to be re-paid over a number of years. The money will
go towards work on the Estádio Magalhães Pessoa, to be used at EURO 2004 and by União de Leiria. Progress on the EURO 2004 project will be under scrutiny by the Executive Committee of UEFA
Wednesday and Thursday in Nyon, Switzerland. (A Bola On-line) 05/07/02 The mayor of Aveiro, Alberto Souto de Miranda, said Friday that the government
is six months behind on the payment of 7.4 million euros promised for the construction of the Municipal stadium in the town, which will host some of the EURO 2004 games and will later be the home of Beira-Mar
. The stadium is scheduled to be completed in the summer of 2003. (A Bola On-line) 02/07/02 The Secretary of State for Sport, Hérminio Loureiro, admitted Tuesday that
some of the stadiums to be used for EURO 2004 were behind schedule but said that the organisation of the tournament was not at risk. "We have to step up the work," he said. (A Bola On-line
) 30/06/02 The president of the National Association of Professional Firefighters said Saturday that just two years away from EURO 2004, to be held in Portugal, none
of the stadiums to be used has a definitive safety and evacuation plan. Fernando Curto also said that he was sceptical that the current firefighting force was sufficient
to cover the event, and that he was worried about the lack of dialogue between the different entities responsible for security. He was speaking at the General Council of the Association in Lisbon. ( A Bola On-line
) 28/06/02 The Portuguese Government have suggested that they may suspend the country's committment to the Schengen agreement (regarding the openness of
borders between European Union countries) during EURO 2004. The news comes after two Members of Parliament belonging to the Left Bloc were prevented
from entering Spain earlier in the week. They were on their way to demonstrate at the Seville summit and were stopped by police on the border with Spain. The
incident has caused outrage in many circles and was the subject of debate in Parliament, where the Prime Minister Durão Barroso said: "We too have the right
to suspend the Schengen agreements, and we will prbably do so in 2004." (A Bola) 26/06/02 President of the Higher Sports Council, and Mayor of Sintra (near Lisbon), Fernando Seará
, called Monday for a change to the constitution that would allow the courts special powers to deal with troublemakers at EURO 2004. On Tuesday, the spokesperson for the Order of Lawyers
, José Miguel Júdice, said that such moves could be illegal. "The last thing we want is for football to affect citizens' fundamental rights," he said. (infordesporto) 29/05/02 UEFA
stadium inspector Ernie Walker is once again in Portugal to check up on progress on the stadiums being built for EURO 2004. The Scotsman has so far
seen work on the stadiums of Coimbra, Sporting and Benfica and has declared himself satisfied with progress. ( A Bola On-line) 15/05/02 The new 25/01/02 The draw took place Friday for the qualifying phase of EURO 2004
. Santa Maria da Feira was the venue for the draw for the ten groups of five teams each which will battle it out for a place in the finals, to be played in Portugal. (See 25/11 for the
qualifying system). The draw is as follows (Portugal qualify automatically as hosts): Group 1: France, Slovenia, Israel, Cyprus, Malta 25/11/01
The seeds have been announced for the EURO 2004 qualifying phase, which will begin on 7/8 September 2002 and end on 11/12 October 2003 (Play-off dates are
15/16 November and 18/19 November, 2003). The seeds are: France, Sweden, Spain, Czech Republic, Germany, Rep. Ireland, Romania, Italy, Belgium, Turkey.
There will be ten groups, the winners of which will qualify automatically for Portugal 2004. The second-placed teams will have to win a play-off to qualify. The 15
countries thus qualified will join the hosts Portugal in the finals. The draw for the qualifying phase will take place on January 25th. (infordesporto) 01/11/01 Both Benfica and Sporting
will receive financial help from Lisbon City Council, in the order of £7.5m, to go towards the building of their new stadiums, to be used in EURO 2004. (A Bola) 12/10/01 The draw
for the qualifying stage of EURO 2004 will take place in the Europarque complex in Santa Maria da Feira, in the North of Portugal, on January 25th, 2002
at 11.00 local time. The 50 countries involved will be drawn into ten groups of five and will play out the qualifying group games between September 7th 2002 and September 12th 2003. The play-offs will be in
November, 2003. there will be five seeds, based on performance at EURO 2004 and the qualifying stage of the 2002 World Cup. France is already a seed. Portugal
will qualify for the competition as hosts and they will be joined by 15 other teams: the winners of each of the ten groups plus the five winners of the play-offs between the second-placed team in each group.
The dates of the qualifying games are the following: 2002 The play-offs will be on November 15 and 16, 2003 (first leg) and November 19 and 20 (second leg)
EURO 2004 will take place between June 12th and July 4th, 2004. (infordesporto) 05/08/01 A meeting of Benfica directors
to discuss the increasingly urgent question of the new Estádio da Luz was postponed Tuesday for lack of a quorum. Mário Dias, vice-president for Benfica's patrimony, was quoted in A Bola
as saying that the the date for the EGM, in which Benfica supporters will vote for or against the new stadium, must be set this week or time will run out for the stadium to be included in
the group of stadiums to be used at EURO 2004. "If we don't say, publicly and urgently, that we will be in the EURO and that we can satisfy all the conditions to
go ahead with the construction of the new stadium, then it will be UEFA itself that removes Benfica, irreversibly," he said. Meanwhile, president of the Financial Department at the club, João Carvalho
, said Tuesday that his department had not yet received any documentation about the new stadium from the board of directors, a worrying situation given the urgency of the case. (A Bola/ maisfutebol ) ( 02/08/01 The UEFA Stadium Commission visited Leiria's municipal stadium Wednesday and Ernie Walker
declared "This is one of the nicest projects of the ten Portuguese stadiums for EURO 2004. The renovated stadium is expected to be ready in July 2003 and the estimated cost is £21m. (A Bola On-line
) 01/08/01 Ernie Walker and the UEFA Stadium Commission are in Portugal again to check up on the progress being made with the stadiums designated for use at EURO 2004
. They visited the Municipal Stadium of Faro/ Loulé in the Algarve Tuesday. Walker said: "Portugal has already proved, with the World Exposition of
1998 that it organised, that it is capable of great undertakings." The Commission visits Lisbon (Benfica, Sporting), Leiria, Aveiro (Beira-Mar) and Oporto (FC Porto, Boavista) Wednesday. (
A Bola On-line) 20/06/01 President of the Portuguese Football Federation Gilberto Madaíl reacted angrily Tuesday to comments made Monday by the Governor of the Bank of Portugal,
who suggested that hard-up Portugal would have to think again about several major national projects, among them the staging of the EURO 2004
Championship. The FPF President said: "This is an investment - it's not expenditure." (infordesporto) 30/05/01 Benfica presented Monday a project for a hypothetical new Luz
stadium to the UEFA authorities in Nyon, Switzerland. The move seems to negate the possibility of a municipal stadium, to be shared with Sporting, which has been doing the
rounds of the press in recent weeks and is still being advocated by the Lisbon City Council. Before the old Luz is brought down and a new one built, the sócios of
Benfica would need to be consulted in a General Meeting, according to a promise made by president Manuel Vilarinho. 09/05/01 Benfica
have decided that the best course of action in terms of the Luz Stadium would be to tear it down and build a new one nearby. The old Luz costs over £1m
a year to maintain and would not be accepted as a venue for Euro 2004 as it is. The other option, of renovating it, has also been rejected as inviable because of the
maintenance costs, which will be similar to now, and the fact that the stadium could still not be used for anything other than football. It would also cost over £30m,
whereas a new stadium will cost double that, with the government footing a quarter of the bill. There have also been reports that Lisbon City Council may get involved
in the project, making the new stadium semi-municipal. The new stadium ( Tuesday also saw work begin on FC Porto 's new 50,000 stadium (
03/04/01 Sports Minister José Lello has extended the deadline for Benfica to submit the project for a new or modified Luz stadium with a view to it being included in the
group of stadiums to be used for EURO 2004. The original deadline was March 31st, now extended to April 23rd. "What is important above all is that Benfica
resolve this question in peace ... because it's important that the Luz is part of the event," said the minister. (infordesporto) 31/03/01 The project for FC Porto
's new stadium ( 13/02/01 The UEFA Stadium Commission
, headed by Ernie Walker, is in Portugal to check up on progess being made on the construction of stdiums for 2004. The president of the Municipal Council of the town of Aveiro in the north (home of
Primeira club Beira-Mar) met with the Commission and afterwards told the press that the local stadium, which was originally budgeted at about £18m will now cost
up to £27m. Excavations on the site of the stadium are to begin in May, construction in August. Completion is scheduled for August 2003. Meanwhile, work on the Estádio Inter-Municipal of Faro/Loulé
(which will be the home of Farense and Louletano after the competition) will begin three months ahead of schedule, in June. (maisfutebol) 04/02/01 The first stone was laid today for
Sporting 's new Alvalade stadium. It will hold over 50,000 spectators and will cost between £50m and £60m, a quarter of which will be paid by the state. Sporting's president, Dias da Cunha, called it "a
pioneering project." It was blessed by a catholic priest. 02/02/01 President of the Portuguese Football Federation, Gilberto Madaíl, has once again
reassured the Portuguese public that work on the stadiums to be used for EURO 2004 is in hand. At the Symposium organized by A Bola, he said that work on all
the ten stadiums involved will be under way by the summer. (See 18/01/01 Sports Minister José Lello has visited the site of Sporting's new Alvalade Stadium,
work on which has just begun: "It was important that I came here so that everyone could see that work on EURO 2004 was under way ... It will be a magnificent and
emblematic stadium and a way for us to demonstrate the rigour with which EURO 2004 will be run." To the suggestion that the Estádio da Luz wll not be used for
the event, the Minister responded: "Deadlines are being respected - the plan for the Luz has until March 31st to be presented ... The final will definitely be in Lisbon,
and nothing stops me from thinking that the Luz will be a venue at EURO 2004." 11/01/01 Work on Sporting's new stadium will now begin on Monday January 15th after
Lisbon City Council gave the official go-ahead. The first jobs will be to fence off the area, next to the existing Alvalade Stadium, and begin excavations. ( Maisfutebol) 10/01/01
Sports Minister José Lello met for the first time with the organizing body of EURO 2004: "EURO 2004 will serve to present 'Portugal' as a brand, a country that does
things well and with rigour ... I'm very optimistic about the future ... We need to be less obsessed about the construction of the stadiums and concentrate more on a
plan of action in strictly organizational and legislative areas, safety, staffing, tickets and other areas equally vital to the success of the event," he said. FPF president,
Gilberto Madaíl, added that "this year is going to be decisive in terms of the solidarity between the organizing body and the Government." He also outlined
some of the strategies planned for publicizing the event, explaining that as from 2002, Portuguese airports will have information desks and that Europe, especially
Spain, and later Latin America and the West Coast of the USA will be targeted. (Jornal de Notícias) 07/01/01 Work on Sporting's new stadium will not now begin tomorrow as previously
planned. The contractors are waiting for a municipal license from the Lisbon City Council. (A Bola) 30/12/00 FPF president Gilberto Madaíl met today with Benfica president Manuel Vilarinho
to discuss progress on preparations for EURO 2004. After the meeting, he said that the Luz stadium will probably be the venue for the final of the competition, but
did not say categorically that it will: "This is a dynamic and not a static process," he said. (Infordesporto) 28/12/00
The city of Coimbra has been given the green light by the government to go ahead with improvements to its Estádio Municipal, to be used at Euro 2004. The work
will go out for tender some time during the first quarter of 2001 and is due to be completed in June 2003. The stadium will be the only one at the championship
which is not fully covered. Sports Minister José Lello took advantage of the presentation of the project to reassure doubters about the smooth running of
preparations: "Euro 2004 will be marked by rigour, transparency, efficiency, exigency and excellence." (Jornal de Notícias) 20/12/00
The Secretary General of the Belgian Football Federation, Alain Courtois, had been in Lisbon attending in a consultative capacity meetings directed towards
discussion of the organization of EURO 2004. Asked if he thought the fact that Portugal has had four Sports Ministers in the last year would prejudice
preparations for the the tournament, he said: "We had six different Ministers of the Interior, responsible for security ... you have to understand that it's not men that
make or break thes projects, it's the institutions involved." 18/12/00 Portugal has a new Sports Minister as from today. The previous one, Armando
Vara, was forced to resign after he was implicated in a public funds scandal. The new minister is José Lello, the fourth in little over a year. He was quick to praise
the efforts of his predecessor and to dispell fears over the future of Portugal's hosting of the EURO 2004 competition: "The deadlines are all within what was
predicted and the EURO will be organized in an exemplary fashion," he said. 20/11/00 Minister of Sport, Armando Vara, met today with various figures involved in the
organization of Euro 2004, including the presidents of FC Porto, Boavista and Sporting Braga, all clubs which are building new stadiums to be used during the
championship. After the meeting, the Minister declared that he was "confident" that all the stadiums and respective infrastructures are on course and will be ready on time. |
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