Paris:UEFA will hold an Executive Committee meeting by videoconference next Thursday, April 23, European football’s governing body has confirmed, as it continues to look at ways of restarting the season in the midst of the coronavirus crisis.
Before that, the heads of each of UEFA’s 55 member associations will come together next Tuesday to look at developments across both domestic and continental competitions. UEFA is also set to meet with the powerful European Club Association (ECA) and the European Leagues grouping on Wednesday.
The meetings could bring confirmation of the postponement of the next women’s European Championship by a year to 2022 — following the earlier decision to postpone the men’s Euro to 2021 — but any other firm decisions may be unlikely. All leading leagues across Europe, as well as the UEFA Champions League and Europa League, were halted in mid-March as countries went into lockdown due to the pandemic. The only country that has kept on playing is Belarus. UEFA has since remained optimistic about the prospect of finishing the European seasons and has been working on the possibility of playing in July and August if need be. The German Football League (DFL) is also set to meet on April 23 to discuss next steps, and is determined to finish the season, with matches behind closed doors, by June 30 to ensure its clubs do not lose out on crucial TV rights revenue. Most teams have resumed training in small groups. Belgium earlier stated its intention to bring an early end to the season, but UEFA responded to their announcement by warning that clubs risk being excluded from European competition next season if their leagues unilaterally decide to declare campaigns over. On Wednesday, Scotland announced an early end to the season in the three leagues below the Premiership, with current league leaders declared champions.
The resolution also allows the ruling SPFL board to call the Premiership as it stands — Celtic are top — if it determines the remaining games cannot be played, but they will be waiting for further guidance from UEFA. The Union of European Football Associations is the administrative body for association football, futsal and beach soccer in Europe, although several member states are primarily or entirely located in Asia.
It is one of six continental confederations of world football’s governing body FIFA. UEFA consists of 55 national members. UEFA represents the national football associations of Europe, runs nation and club competitions including the UEFA European Championship, UEFA Nations League, UEFA Champions League, UEFA Europa League, and UEFA Super Cup, and controls the prize money, regulations, and media rights to those competitions.
Henri Delaunay was the first general secretary and Ebbe Schwartz the first president. The current president is Aleksander Ceferin, a former Football Association of Slovenia president, who was elected as UEFA’s seventh president at the 12th Extraordinary UEFA Congress in Athens in September 2016, and automatically became a vice-president of the world body FIFA.
UEFA was founded on 15 June 1954 in Basel, Switzerland after consultation between the Italian, French, and Belgian associations. The European football union began with 25 members; that number doubled by the early 1990s as new associations were born out of the fragmentation of the Soviet Union, Yugoslavia and Czechoslovakia into their constituent states. (AFP)
