Life, the Universe and Everything

This year’s Champions League final is guaranteed to produce an English winner. Following Manchester United’s victory over Barcelona last night, Chelsea take on Liverpool at Stamford Bridge tonight for the second final spot.

Although this is the first time the final has been an all-English affair, it is not the first time that one nation has provided both finalists since the 1997/98 competition where the top clubs of each league rather than just the champions were permitted to enter. In 2000 Real Madrid beat Valencia in the Stade de France - the first time that the final was between domestic rivals - and in 2003 AC Milan beat Juventus on penalties at Old Trafford.

This year’s final will be held at the Luzhniki Stadium in Moscow as part of Uefa’s system of rotating the final venue. The venue is selected two years in advance - in 2009 it will be held at Rome’s Stadio Olimpico, the following year it will be held at the Madrid, Santiago Bernabéu - and has meant that some teams have won the European Cup in the own national stadium.

I think that it is about time for a change. With environmental concerns about carbon footprints, reducing air miles and knitting your own tofu the selection of final venues should be made once the finalists are known. This would allow us to keep the travelling by the fans attending to a minimum. It would also ensure that a neutral venue hosts the tournament’s finale. Of course, this system is not perfect as it would favour the central European nations at the expense of those around the periphery.

Another problem with Moscow hosting this year’s final contested by two English teams is the police. I am not suggesting that Russian police are any worse than those across the rest of Europe, but the English police deal with supporters of these teams week in, week out. We have grown accustomed to each other and know what will and what will not be tolerated. Of course, I am not predicting riots and running battles on the streets of Moscow next month, but a criticism of foreign police forces is that their reaction to boisterous behaviour is always that the response was heavy-handed and disproportionate. This could all have been avoided if Uefa had waited until this week to select a venue.