Euro 2008 Seedings Announced

[Siawash]

Gav

 

[Internazionale]

New trophy for UEFA EURO 2008™
Monday, 23 January 2006

UEFA will unveil a new trophy for UEFA EURO 2008™ on Thursday in Montreux, Switzerland ahead of the competition's qualifying round draw the following day

Modern design
The new UEFA European Championship trophy is 18 centimetres higher and two kilos heavier than the original designed by Arthus Bertrand in 1960 and named after Henri Delaunay, the former president of the French Football Federation. The upper part of the trophy is based on the original and is also made out of sterling silver. The new trophy, created by Asprey London, will also retain its historical name.

On display
It will be officially unveiled at the Montreux Congress Centre by UEFA President Lennart Johansson, UEFA Chief Executive Lars-Christer Olsson and the presidents of the two EURO 2008™ host associations, Ralph Zloczower from Switzerland and Austria's Friedrich Stickler on Thursday at 15.00CET. It will be on display at the qualifying round draw the next day.

You can follow Friday's draw live on uefa.com.

A new EURO trophy to be displayed this coming thursday !! Sweet ! can't wait to see the draw to be made this coming Friday on January 27th !

 

[Punkt]

too bad we can't get Greece

 

[Fernandez]

What are the odds for Greece not to qualify for EURO 2008?

 

[Internazionale]

The new EURO trophy has just been revealed today.

Bigger and better
"We felt the EURO was one of the two most important international football competitions in the world, but that the trophy was very small and a little bit anonymous so the President [Lennart Johansson] thought we should study the possibility of changing it," UEFA communications director William Gaillard said. "We rapidly abandoned the idea of having a golden trophy - we thought we could leave that for the world competitions. Also, we decided people had got used to the shape of the trophy. The problem was it was very small, much smaller than the UEFA Champions League or UEFA Cup trophies, for instance. And so we decided to make it larger."

Minor changes
It is almost an exact replica, though not quite. A small figure juggling a ball on the back of the original has been removed, as has the marble plinth. The silver base of the trophy also had to be enlarged to make it stable. The names of the winning countries that had appeared on the plinth have now been engraved on the back of the trophy, which is made of sterling silver, weighs 8kgs and is 60cm tall.

Classic style
The responsibility for creating the original went to Pierre Delaunay, son of Henri Delaunay, the visionary behind the competition. Henri Delaunay died in 1955 before seeing his idea come to fruition, but the new prize is testament to his enduring legacy. Unlike other designs for UEFA trophies, the new-look Henri Delaunay trophy has maintained its classic style. "We've kept it because this competition goes back to 1960, but if you look at some of the other trophies we have they are very avant-garde looking," Gaillard said. "Some of the women's trophies and the Under-17 and U19 trophies, are very stylised, very modern, but this one we just wanted to keep the way it was."

'Focal point'
Unlike the original, which was the work of the Chobillon goldsmith and was later bought by Arthus Bertrand in Paris, making the modern equivalent was entrusted to Asprey London. Asprey, renowned silversmiths, jewellers and goldsmiths, have a long history of trophy-making stretching back to the America's Cup, which their sister company Garrard made in 1848. "UEFA wanted to improve on the quality but also the scale of the trophy," Asprey spokesman Steven Maddison said. "They wanted to have a focal point for the event and the trophy they had was fairly small for doing that.

'Higher quality'
"We had to keep to quite a strict guideline as it needed to reflect the trophy that went before," he added. "We've enlarged it and tweaked it slightly but the actual style and shape is pretty much as it was. The quality of the metal used is much higher and the workmanship is of a much higher quality. You won't find a superior trophy." The eventual winners of UEFA EURO 2008™ will second that. Greece's Theodoros Zagorakis was the last captain to lift the old trophy in Lisbon in July 2004. Whoever follows his lead will be getting his hands on an even more substantial reward.

 

[yoyo913]

excited.. tomorrow it is

Romania have a good chance if all goes well of getting back in competitions...

 

[10Ruud]

It would be nice to see Romania in something it seems they've been on the sidelines for awhile now.....maybe they should all dye their hair blond again.

 

[$teauA]

It would be nice to see Romania in something it seems they've been on the sidelines for awhile now.....maybe they should all dye their hair blond again.

I hope they don't. The two results when they decided to do that stupid thing were 1-1 against Tunisia and 0-1 against Croatia.

 

[TheBizkit03]

scotland

 

[Andrejs]

Oh ******* hell, couldn't be more happier

Sweden, Denmark and Spain in Riga plus England in Tallinn

 

[faceNside]

Spain with Sweden and Denmark... Should be balanced

 

[Juventino]

All groups:

A
Portugal
Poland
Serbia-Montenegro
Belgium
Finland
Armenia
Azerbaijan
Kazakhstan

B
France
Italy
Ukraine
Scotland
Lithuania
Georgia
Faroe Islands

C
Greece
Turkey
Norway
Bosnia-Herzegovina
Hungary
Moldova
Malta

D
Czech Republic
Germany
Slovakia
Rep Ireland
Wales
Cyprus
San Marino

E
England
Croatia
Russia
Israel
Estonia
Macedonia
Andorra

F
Sweden
Spain
Denmark
Latvia
Iceland
Northern Ireland
Liechtenstein

G
Holland
Romania
Bulgaria
Slovenia
Albania
Belarus
Luxembourg

 

[Hendrik]

Nice group for Scotland...Italy, France, Ukraine.

excited.. tomorrow it is

Romania have a good chance if all goes well of getting back in competitions...

Romania's group looks really tough. Bulgaria, Slovenia, Albania, and Belarus are all decent teams.

 

[Zlatan]

w00t, I might see Maxim in real life now that we're in the group with Belarus!

I think it's an easy group really, should be able to qualify...

 

[Punkt]

our group isn't so easy as the portuguese press is saying right now... we have the longest group with travels to Kazakhstan, Armenia and Azerbaijan and i remember that in the last away games against Armenia and Azerbaijan we tied both. and Poland, Serbia, Belgium and Finland for only 2 spots will be tough. but we are favourites though.

 

[Jambo Den]

Oh f*ck off!

 

[Punkt]

Oh f*ck off!

i wanted scotland

 

[Nakamura]

our group isn't so easy as the portuguese press is saying right now... we have the longest group with travels to Kazakhstan, Armenia and Azerbaijan and i remember that in the last away games against Armenia and Azerbaijan we tied both. and Poland, Serbia, Belgium and Finland for only 2 spots will be tough. but we are favourites though.

Yeah, in fact I think it's one of the toughest groups. Poland, Serbia, Belgium and Finland are all good teams. The level of the group is very similar. Then we have the eastern European teams, which are also hard to play away because of the long travels and weather.

But I'm glad with the group, because we're guaranteed to have some great football and it will be a very good test to out ability.

 

[::shinji::]

bah, I hate it when we have to play countries like Armenia, Azerbaijan, etc... that's where we seems great at f*cking up Serbia, Belgium, Poland....those are all contenders for the top spot IMO, and Finland can be trouble too. We got our work cut out for us this time, if we ever needed a guy like Mourinho in charge it's during that qualifying campaign. We won't be able to afford Scolari's sh!tty player choices to cost us a single point.

 

[TOON ARMY]

Russia, Croatia and Israel are no pushovers but we should win that group.

OMG, hard luck Scotland :funny: