Euro 2012

Preparations for the construction of the stadium’s roof are underway: the first of 72 huge elements has arrived from Italy.

On Thursday the first of 72 elements of the inner ring truss arrived from Italy, one of the main elements of the roof. The element is over 12.5 meters long and weighs 48 tons.

First attempts at laying out the concrete for the floor construction on level +1 have begun, over the main entrance to the stadium. Work on the foundations under the columns of the steel roof is being done under a heated tent.

48 out of 72 steel support pillars for the roof’s construction have also arrived. Each element weighs 3.5 tons. The steel construction’s assembly will begin in March.

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Preparations for the Euro 2012 football tournament in Poland and Ukraine are well on track, the ruling body UEFA said on Friday with nine days left until the qualifying group draw.

The February 7 draw in Warsaw is the first big event around the tournament which created various problems in the early stages after the two Eastern European nations were elected hosts in 2007.

‘Preparations for Euro 2012 are going well,’ UEFA general secretary Gianni Infantino told the body’s website after an executive board meeting on Thursday in Malta.

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The Ukrainian war between the president, prime minister and parliament and Euro 2012 in the background is gaining in strength.

Viktor Yushchenko has once again refused to sign the law on the preparations for the tournament, and thus he blocked the payment of the money. Local authorities throw down their arms and state that without government support there will not be a cup-final in Kiev.

The Government of Ukraine, which bears the results of the economic crisis is seeking money wherever to save the Euro 2012. There are not so many opportunities. One of the most serious opportunity was to be a national bank, or rather its financial reserves. Of these, the Ukrainian Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko wanted to “snatch” almost 10 billion hryvnia in order that the biggest sport event in this country not resulted in a failure but without success.

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UEFA is delighted with the progress of Ukraine in preparations to organize the European football championships in 2012 in recent months – assessed on Wednesday in Kiev, Martin Kallen, UEFA chief executive for Euro 2012.

- Now, the situation looks good, works are being made, so we are pleased with the progress made by Ukraine – said Kallen at the press conference.

When asked by journalists how he assess the level of preparations in Poland and Ukraine Kallen said that “it is equal.”
He also pointed out that the Ukrainians still have a lot to catch up but if they deal with it, the division of host cities for Euro 2012 in Poland and Ukraine according to the 4×4 formula will be maintained. (read more…)

UEFA president Michel Platini has announced that he is pleased with Poland’s progress towards hosting the for coming UEFA EURO 2012™.

Platini believes that the UEFA EURO 2012™ organizing committee is operating successfully and the whole process of preparing the tournament is under control – such conclusions were reached by UEFA officials who have been following the situation in Poland to date.

“Preparations for UEFA EURO 2012™ in Poland are being realized according to schedule, but the situation in Ukraine is quite complex,” stated Platini after meeting the President of the EU Parliament, Jerzy Buzek.

In contrast, the decision on which cities in Ukraine can hold UEFA EURO 2012™ matches is yet to be made in December. Currently, observers are working on a complete report of Ukraine’s preparations.

Last May, UEFA stated that only Kiev meets all the football association’s required conditions and expectations. Three other cities – Donetsk, Lviv and Kharkiv – have been given a chance to convince UEFA they will be able to organize championship matches until December 2009.

Finally, Michel Platini was also asked about the UEFA EURO 2012™ final, scheduled to be played in Kyiv, and the UEFA head confirmed that the city still needs to improve the hotel and transportation situation.

Over the next few months the construction of a football stadium in Lvov, which is to host the European Football Championships of 2012, will be carried out in the system of a 24-hour period – informed Ukrinform, the Ukrainian news agency.

Speeding up the works is the result of a general contractor’s agreement Azovintex from Mariumpola with the city authorities. According to the new work schedule, the delay of construction in relation to the deadlines set by the UEFA is to be eliminated during the two months before the announced visit of the stadium by the UEFA representatives.

The total cost of building a stadium in Lvov is to be close at 609.5 million hryvnias (about 78 million dollars) and the completion of the work is planned for June 2010.

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Engineers of the technical office of the contractor of the national stadium construction have changed the system of constructing ten of the twelve staircases in order to speed up part of the construction works – announced on Sunday the construction manager on behalf of the contractor of the consortium Alpine Construction Poland, Marcin Zareba.

- From Saturday, one of 12 staircases is built at a speed of 2 cm per hour – Zareba said. – We decided to construct staircases in the sliding system, rather than, as originally planned, in a traditional system – explained the construction manager. He added that the sliding system is the technology used in the construction of chimneys and it is a continuous concreting along with simultaneous lifting of formworks (a temporary form used to give shape of the concrete mass) for the total and target height of the staircase – about 40 m.

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The city authorities have devoted 173.7 millions of hryvnias for the preparation of the Charkow region for the EURO 2012.

The largest part of these funds will be spent on the modernization of a stadium and the runway of the Charkow airport.

100 millions of gryvnias devoted to the reconstruction of Metallist stadium, 56.7 millions of hryvnias for the reconstruction of the runaway of the International Airport in Charkow and 17 millions of hryvnias for the reconstruction of roads.

The authorities also freed from the duty goods and commodities (total 10 names), which are not produced in Ukraine and which were not imported to the country and were used as an equipment for the Metallist stadium.

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Where even soccer is politics, infrastructure improvements have fallen behind.

KIEV — In Ukraine, soccer is simply politics pursued through other means.
The vicious and sometimes petty power struggle at the highest reaches of the country’s government has spilled over to its sports fields.

Two years ago, UEFA, Europe’s governing soccer body, awarded Ukraine and its Slavic neighbor Poland the prestigious designation as co-hosts of the European soccer championships in 2012. The European championship, held every four years, is the largest international soccer tournament after the World Cup and one of the world’s largest sporting events.

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The construction of the stadium is delayed and the money for it stolen – announced a select committee appointed by the Ukrainian parliament to investigate the uncertainties concerning rebuilding of the final arena of Euro 2012.

The head of the select committee, Rawil Safiullin has no illusions. – Everything points to the fact that the money is stolen – said Rawil in the Ukrainian newspaper “Today”. According to him, millions of ‘hrywien’ which flow from the country’s budget spreads “somewhere” on its way. Last year, the main contractor promised to build the stadium in July 2010 for 1.5 billion of ‘hrywien’ – says Safiullin.

Now, it appears that until this time there will only be prepared a project documentation. The final cost of the stadium is still unknown although the government devoted to the construction 2.114 billion of ‘hrywien’. We are dealing with the apparent theft of public money!

The head of the select committee called for quick laying off those people who are responsible for the supervision of investments. He added that they are responsible for the delay and abuse. – Otherwise we may lose Euro 2012 and it will be a shame to the whole world!.

This is not the only problem of the hosts of Euro 2012. In fact, the country still does not have an accepted plan of preparations for the championships. – The plan is not yet ready, there is no a settled position as to the amount of means that we can be devoted to the preparations – confessed Minister of Economy Piotr Krupko to ‘Dieło’.

In particular the focus is on the variations in the construction and modification required by UEFA 135 hotels. And without that, as previously warned the head of UEFA , Michel Platini, Euro 2012 in Ukraine can not take place.