There were three bids to host the Euro 2012 tournament - from Italy, Hungary/Croatia and Poland/Ukraine - and Platini's new UEFA regime have shown further intentions regarding the attempted redistribution of European football wealth by choosing Poland/Ukraine. Similarly to any major development in our global sport, the decision was made against a template of political reality.
In the early stages of his presidency, Platini has created his administrative team and has largely stuck by his election promises to democratise the game in Europe. There have been more referees from Eastern Europe in both the Champions League and the UEFA Cup and, to a large extent, he has sidelined some of the referees who choose to operate alongside bookmakers. So far so good. But Platini inherited a contest featuring a shoddy little three runner handicap from which to select it's marketing beacon for 2012.
Applying a very brief overview to the individual bids. The location-elect had always been Italy. Then came calciocaos, a devalued Serie A and the return of the ultras. This state of affairs was then compounded by the announcement from prosecutors in Napoli that calciocaos is more widely spread than originally perceived. By releasing this information less than a week before the vote, Napoli spiked an already damaged bid.
Croatia/Hungary would not have been a good choice on several levels. Croatian mafia have infiltrated many leagues around Europe with their unique blend of football betting market corruption (see numerous previous posts on Robert Hoyzer and the scandal in Germany, for example). Meanwhile the Hungarian prime minister, Ferenc Gyurcsány, last September stated that he had been lying to his country for the last one and a half to two years. Although one would have thought that such a talent be a prerequisite for the post of prime ministership, his handling of the ensuing crisis was amateurish and organising a piss up in a brewery would severely tax the man. Corruption and hooliganism are par for the course in both countries.
Which leaves Poland and Ukraine.
As we have posted previously (see: http://footballisfixed.blogspot.com/2006/12/branded-orange-coup.html), Ukraine is receiving beneficial treatment on a range of levels as the west continues with it's strategy of attempting to snatch Ukraine from under Putin's nose. The pseudo-revolution and takeover was backed by western bankers, the military-business elite and politicians. Frequently, spectacular society bestows upon "new democracies" (sic) the honour of sporting achievement in parallel to their political upheaval. This increases a countries feelgood factor and proves to the idiotic that shareholder capitalism is somehow equated with success. Since the glorious overthrow of Yanukovich, Ukraine has been treated to the economic mismanagement of Yushchenko and the devious realpolitik of Yulia Tymoshenko resulting in the people returning Yanukovich to power. Some revolution... Now the west are utilising unconstitutional tactics to dissolve Ukraine's parliament in an attempt to generate a more pliable government. Ukraine is, in effect, two countries. The west has been influenced by Polish embrace of neo-con capitalism while the east is still in the Soviet Union. UEFA's support for the Ukraine half of the 2012 bid is a position taken under the duress of political pressure.
And Ukrainian football is no better. Corruption is endemic and match fixing is rife. Foreign officials have to be used for the big Kyiv v Donetsk games as no domestic referees are seen as neutral. The Ukrainian Football Federation (UFF) is currently at the centre of a controversy relating to it's concealment of the use of Performance Enhancing Substances (PESs) by leading Ukrainian players. Additionally, prior to last summer's World Cup, Blokhin, the blockhead Ukrainian manager, uttered several racisms that, in a proper sport, would lead to a ban and exclusion. Obviously, FIFA took no action and, now, UEFA reward him with Euro 2012. Super!
As we posted last week (see: http://footballisfixed.blogspot.com/2007/04/bandits-taking-over-town.html), Polish authorities opportunistically targeted two top league teams a week prior to the Euro 2012 vote and, pending appeals, relegated them for their indiscretions. But this is largely tokenistic spin. Until recently, the Polish FA was in open warfare with the Polish government. Less than two months ago, FIFA had threatened to ban Polish teams from all international competition after Sports Minister Tomasz Lipiec suspended the Polish FA's executive committee for "not doing enough to stop corruption in domestic football". At the time the Ukrainian FA President, Hryhorii Surkis, referring to Lipiec stated that "only an enemy of Euro 2012 could act in this way". This certainly augurs well for future collaboration between the two countries as their successful bid moves forward. Hooliganism is also a major concern in Poland plus, earlier this season, Wisła Kraków player Nikola Mijailovic was banned by UEFA for five games for racially abusing Benni McCarthy while Wisła fans showed a distinct contempt for the progress of evolution by their racist grunts in the same tie.
Rather aptly considering it is a dual bid, the main potential problems may be demonstrated by focusing on two sets of brothers. Ukrainian football is dominated by Hryhorii Surkis, the UFF President, and Ihor Surkis, the Kyiv Dynamo President. That two such powerful positions are sibling controlled is not a meritocratic indicator. Collusion was the charge of Mircea Lucescu, the Shakhtar Donetsk coach, regarding Hryhorii's choice of referees for Ihor's games. Lucescu stated at the time "the federation and Dynamo are the same body" while Boris Kolesnikov (head of the federation's Donetsk branch) demanded Hryhorii's resignation as "the word corruption is stamped on his forehead". So, it seems we can have confidence in the Ukrainian half of the bid.
Polish twins Lech (President) and Jarosław (Prime Minister) Kaczyński take lack of meritocracy to the even higher levels of the Bush/Bush or Clinton/Clinton type of democratic deficit. In their favour, they are zealously anti-corruption but it is this very zealous attribute which they share that undermines their political validity. Insularity and centre-right xenophobicness describe a party that retains power only by coalitions with anti-semitic groups. In their revenge missions against the Układ - a network of communist era spies - and their collaborators (no truth and reconciliation here), the twins have created a lustration law that even right wing economist, Jan Winiecki, says "puts its authors (the Kaczyński's) beyond the pale of western civilisation". Poland has slipped backwards since the twins came to power and it is inappropriate that such limited politicians and footballing authorities (from both countries) should be the recipients of UEFA largesse.
Following the result of the vote in Cardiff yesterday, Ferenc Gyurcsány said he believed that "economic factors" had led the UEFA officials to opt for Poland and Ukraine. Of course, he may have been lying but we totally agree with him. Although we would choose to add geopolitical and national political factors too. By choosing to place a major sporting competition in Russia's near abroad, the west is merely ratcheting up the symbolic rhetoric in the ongoing re-energisation of a Cold War that was supposed to have been perestroica'ed away in 1989. Incidentally, we are all entirely convinced that the momentum behind a Poland/Ukraine victory has absolutely nothing to do with the current kerfuffle over US plans to employ a missile shield in Poland and similar US intentions to include Ukraine in the US air defence system (see: http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=viewArticle&code=20070305&articleId=4994).
Platini inherited a flawed contest and we could have produced as damning a post about either of the other two applications. He is morally correct to move the power base to the east but the candidates available ensured that the hijacking of the process that had solidified under Johansson eventually came to pass. If the bidding process could have been reopened, we would have suggested România and Hungary so that the competition might be used to confront historical conflict and current bigotry by celebrating a new EU future through the beauty of football (similar to Japan and the Republic of Korea's joint hosting of the 2002 World Cup).
The major holistic impact of yesterday's decision is to bring the European Super League incrementally closer as the G14(18) do not wish to see any indication that Europe's footballing centre of gravity is distorting eastwards or that Michel Platini might be willing to stick to the letter of his manifesto.
