UEFA have been planning a number of changes to their European competitions and perhaps the most infamous one is the closed league structure of the Champions League.
UEFA are thinking of turning the Champions League into a league-like-tournament and this has not gone down too well with all the leagues in Europe.
And now the governing body of football is planning to usher in yet another change but unlike the restructuring of the Champions League, this one should be met with mostly positive reviews from the clubs as well as the fans.
As per reports, UEFA are planning to restrict the Champions League final to four or five major European stadiums.
This basically means only a couple of the top European stadium will get the luxury of hosting the final of the UCL in rotation basis.
While some countries are bound to protest against this but largely this plan is going to benefit fans as they do not have to travel to odd locations to watch their club play.
“What is my thinking now is we should play the finals in bigger stadiums even if we go to the same places, the same four or five places all the time,” UEFA president Aleksander Ceferin said(as reported).
“I’m talking about the Champions League only because it is the top of the top event. For example for Madrid, we had 980,000 requests.
“So even if we’d play in Wembley we would have 30,000 more. It would change something.
“Probably a top, top, top event should be played only at the top venues. Hotel-wise, mobility-wise, stadium-wise.
“But the Europa League and everything else should be shared with the others who love football.”
Some experts have recommended that along with the Champions League, the Europa League should also be enforced with this exact same rule – especially after what happened during this year’s final between Chelsea and Arsenal.
The all-English final of the UEL was played in Baku, Azerbaijan which proved to be a nightmare for the fans, the majority of whom were travelling from England.
This led to many fans refusing to make the long travel which ended meant that the 69,000 odd capacity stadium had a significant number of empty seats.
This move from UEFA will surely be welcomed by almost all the major leagues in Europe primarily because on paper the final is mostly played between teams from a handful of the top European leagues.
And UEFA hosting the final in only a handful of big stadiums will not only help the fans save a lot of finances but they will also get a varied number of options while planning the trip.
