God

The European championship is set to be expanded to feature 24 teams from 2016 instead of the current 16, according to Franz Beckenbauer.

A Uefa executive committee meeting on Thursday discussed the issue and will rubber-stamp the decision on Friday.

"Yes for sure it's going to be 24 teams," said Beckenbauer, who is vice-chairman of Uefa's development and technical assistance committee.

"The European Championships will not lose any quality by that."
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Former German international Beckenbauer is not a Uefa executive committee member but is a European Fifa executive member who sits in on the meetings as a non-voting observer.

The proposal to expand the competition was put forward by the Scottish Football Association and Football Association of Ireland last year.

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The new format will mean fewer countries will have the capacity to host the tournament but it is believed the 53 member nations are unanimously in favour of the change.

"I think the expansion will be better for the game - more teams will have the chance of qualifying and the excitement of the groups will go on for longer," said Scottish FA chief executive Gordon Smith.

"It is disappointing in that it means we will not be able to stage the tournament in the future, and we recognise that will be the case.

"It was a trade-off between trying to stage it or open up the qualification process and we have decided to look at something that helps everybody."

Spain emerged victorious at Euro 2008 earlier this year at a tournament where there was no presence from the home nations.

The expanded version should mean it is easier for Scotland and other home nations to qualify but Smith added: "It will make it easier for other countries such as England who failed to qualify for Euro 2008.
"We didn't do it specifically for that purpose however."



At least this way we might qualify!

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Crocker

What a crap idea!!

They will be far too many weak teams in it

God

You can make that arguement for anything. Derby had no chance of Winning the Premier League, does that mean the league should be cut down in size?

Whats the problem with having more countries in it? It gives the "weaker" nations a realistic chance of getting to a big tournament which could do wonders for their future generations of footballers who decide to start playing in hopes of making it professional.

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The Phantom

We still won't qualify...

God

Ironically i was thinking the same when reading it. 24 qualify? we'll finish 25th so.

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Tyler Durden

Horrible idea.

Didn't work for the World Cup in 1982 or 1986 because you either have to let 16 teams out of 24 through to the last 16....so you spend that whole 1st round just to eliminate 8 teams!

Or, you do some convoluted triple threat group thing as they did in 82 which was abysmal (they had 12 teams go through and split them into four groups of 3!!)

So what then happens is that they will do this for 1 or 2 tournos, see how it doesn't work and then increase it to 32 for the next one after that and we end up with the whole of Europe qualifying. And as is the case in wrestling, when EVERYONE is special....NOBODY is special!