Michel Platini has said he is at last confident Ukraine can host Euro 2012 . After several 'last chance' warnings over the past three years, the UEFA boss can tear a few fewer hairs out now the four stadia do seem to be on track for next summer. "A year ago, we were deciding whether to leave four or two cities," Platini told reporters on a tour of Kharkiv. "And today we have four cities." "There are no serious problems in preparing for Euro 2012," he continued, "but there are many minor tasks and problems that need to be solved." For Platini, a successful Euro 2012 is crucial to his reputation as an organiser of big soccer tournaments as he continues his silent campaign for the FIFA Presidency at some point in the future. The Frenchman has found the two hosts' lack of infrastructure and slow construction progress compared to western European nations an ongoing headache, and has constantly had to threaten them with being stripped of hosting rights. Spain was the first nation touted as a replacement back in 2008, when World Soccer's Keir Radnedge boldly announced neither Poland nor Ukraine would host Euro 2012. Then Germany entered the picture, either as sole host or as joint organiser with Poland. Now it is clear UEFA is not turning back and is throwing its cards on the table with the two unknown East European hosts. By rights the tournament should have been Italy's, but the calciopoli scandal and an upsurge in high-profile hooliganism let the duo in through the back door. It promises to be a unique European Championship, a foretaste perhaps of the 2018 World Cup in neighbouring Russia. The cheap transport promised to fans facing extraordinarily long journeys between venues (Gdansk to Donetsk is 933 miles/1502km) yet to materialise. Next month Platini visits Poland to inspect their venues, with the opening date of Warsaw's new arena still up in the air. (c) Sean O'Conor & Soccerphile UEFA EURO 2012 8th June -1st July 2012 VENUES Poland Warsaw 58,224 (opening game and semi-final) Gdansk 44,636 Poznan 43,090 Wroclaw 44,416 Ukraine Kiev 63,195 (semi-final and final) Donetsk 50,055 Kharkiv 35,721 Lviv 34, 915 Qualifiers Poland, Ukraine, Germany, Spain, Netherlands, Italy and ten others to be decided. Tags World Cup Pens World Cup Posters Euro 2012 football

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With the World Cup exposing a number of ageing European teams in need of new blood, a glimpse of the immediate future can be seen at the 2010 UEFA U-19 Championship , taking place in France at the moment. Reigning champions Ukraine, who hosted the 2009 edition, failed to qualify, but hosts France have stormed into the last four, trouncing the Netherlands 4-1 and Austria 5-0. Joining them from group A are England , who beat Austria 3-2, drew 1-1 with France and lost 0-1 to the Dutch. Although the French are the tournament's highest scorers, top of the points charts are surprise, surprise, Spain , the only unbeaten team. The Spanish U19s defeated Croatia and Portugal 2-1 before a comfortable 3-0 dismissal of Italy. Top of the goal charts with three strikes are Liverpool's Spanish prodigy Daniel Pacheco and Croatian midfielder Zvonko Pamic, who plays for Freiburg in Germany. UEFA U-19 Semi-Finals Tue 27th July SPAIN v ENGLAND Saint-Lo 1600 FRANCE v CROATIA Caen 1900 Final Fri 30th July (c) Sean O'Conor & Soccerphile Tags World Cup Pens World Cup Posters World Cup football

The English football season reaches its climax in the same week as the British General Election campaign reaches the finish line. Like the annual Premier League toss-up between Chelsea and Manchester United, the General Election is usually a straight fight between the reds and blues, but this year the election has seen an orange team appear from nowhere in the form of a congenial and assured televisual image named Nick Clegg . There is no orange interloper in football however, where Hull City fell out the Premier League and Wolves struggled, although Blackpool may yet make it to the promised land via the play-offs. Football and politics have generally taken different roads in Britain, perhaps as a testament to the social delineation of the working class in industrial regions from the ruling class in the Westminster village. But the sport's booming popularity in recent years has dragged the suits into the grounds, or at least forced them to pay lip service to the people's game from the lofty perch of the executive box. Although overseas leaders had been doing it for years, such as when Benito Mussolini shamelessly hijacked the 1934 World Cup , it was Huddersfield FC man Harold Wilson who first twigged that football's popularity could rub off onto British politicians, when England won the World Cup during his Premiership. As comic creation Alf Garnett quipped , it must have been Wilson who made England wear Labour red for the final. Wilson's populist move backfired when he closely identified himself with England's 1970 squad, whose painful elimination 's proximity to the election cost him his job, he later claimed. The Prime Minister had himself photographed with the team in front of No. 10, Downing Street, setting a precedent repeated every four years since. In the 1980s, a PM virulently hostile to football held sway but even the Iron Lady found her swinging handbag unable to put soccer in its place and she grudgingly went ahead with some winsome photoshoots with Emlyn Hughes, Kevin Keegan et al. Margaret Thatcher saw no connection between her economic policies and the growth of spectator violence, and was taken aback when FA Secretary Ted Croker told her pointedly, "Not our hooligans, Prime Minister, but yours. The products of your society." Her magic wand was an ill-conceived plan to force fans to carry an I.D. card, which would be withdrawn from the miscreants. It was an unnecessary endeavour, which would have failed to stop fights outside grounds and was obviated anyway by the arrival of CCTV inside them, but was enthusiastically trumpeted for too long by the shrill Colin Moynihan, aka The Miniature for Sport, until the Hillsborough tragedy sank the soccer ID ship for good. The Thatcher years did foment some form of politicisation among fans and legacies of her general disconnection from the industrial regions who breathed football strongest included the Football Supporters Association , the start of supporter involvement in clubs and a burgeoning fanzine culture rejecting the official face of the game and the authorities. The grassroots were very green in the late 1980s as Thatcher's reign tottered towards its inevitable end, but football remained very much a minority interest in Britain as a whole. The fences, the strict policing, the labeling of fans as hooligans by the largely right-wing media had created a siege mentality among die-hards constantly challenging the public consensus that football belonged in the gutter. The enlightenment of Italia '90 and the seismic year zero of Sky TV's Premier League in 1993 lay in an unimagined future. Thatcher's successor John Major was less abrasive than his predecessor towards everything, and immediately said he was a Chelsea fan, making sure he was filmed attending games with fellow Tory David Mellor MP, although interestingly his sporting interests were listed as 'cricket and rugby' before he became PM. Pavarotti, Gazza and all had brought a spring-cleaning no-one had expected, but the after-effects in England of that summer in Italy were too powerful and popular to ignore at the highest level again. Engaging with England's football culture was now de rigueur for its top politicians. Tony Blair joined the club, claiming he was a Newcastle fan (his constituency was in the North-East), kicking around with Alex Ferguson and Kevin Keegan and rushing to tell the nation he was one of us when England were knocked out the World Cup. Gordon Brown has wasted little time kicking a ball for the cameras to launch England's 2018 World Cup bid, and the Scot who lost an eye at rugby made sure the film crew was there to see him grinning at the Three Lions winning at football on telly. Well-to-do Londoner and Old Etonian David Cameron has been at pains to paint himself as a footy man. He claims to support Aston Villa (his uncle used to be chairman), attached a St. George's cross to his bicycle in 2006 and invited himself to David Beckham's pre-World Cup party when he was not on the guest list. Never again will a British party leader shun the nation's number one sport you can be sure, but how refreshing it would be if they did, expressing a preference for a less-mainstream game or pastime instead of pandering to the PR protocols. While leaders are desperate to appear as fans, even to the extent of humiliating themselves , the players are generally much less keen on politics, preferring to enjoy their lifestyles without concern for the bigger picture, although their stratospheric wages militate towards right-wing votes. Even in the 1960s, Hunter Davies was surprised when writing 'The Glory Game' that none of the Tottenham players he got to know were Labour supporters at a time when the majority of the nation was left-leaning. An exception to the apolitical player was Scotland international Pat Nevin, who campaigned openly for Labour and made a point of travelling to Chelsea games by tube to dispel the image of overpaid stars voting for whoever would hand them the lowest taxes. Frank Lampard, who has been a vocal supporter of the Conservative Party, stands out as a politically-aware footballer today, while Sir Alex Ferguson continues to fly the flag for Labour . But they are still voices in the wilderness. Everyone ought to care about politics, whatever their status. And the nation cares about football sufficiently in terms of hours and money to make the election relevant to fans . Gary Lineker said he would not reveal his voting intention for fear of alienating some of his fans, and perhaps that is the wisest counsel, but should not stars of any description consider using their clout to campaign on an issue that matters, even if not on a Jamie Oliver scale? So is this election relevant to football fans? Labour's proposal to let fans own 25% of clubs is at least worth debating. With on average four clubs a year in Britain going into administration over the past decade, and clubs run in such a cavalier fashion it makes investment banks look prudent, how the game is regulated by government does matter - just ask Crystal Palace or Portsmouth supporters this season. With Michel Platini's calls for English clubs to sort themselves out or face sanction growing louder all the time, the fields of politics and football are far from mutually exclusive. But the reality is football will be low to non-existent in people's minds as they enter the polling stations on Thursday. Most players don't really care who wins any more than the politicians care who wins the Premier League this weekend, but you can bet the latter will still be screaming they are one of us once the World Cup kicks off in June. As long as football enthralls millions, politics will be looking to jump on the bandwagon. (c) Sean O'Conor & Soccerphile

WARSAW, EURO 2012 Qualifying Draw As if worrying about Ukraine's hotels, roads and airports was not enough, UEFA President Michel Platini had other questions to answer in his press conference on the eve of the European Championship qualifying draw. Depressingly, four separate English journalists asked him the same question in different wording about John Terry's sex scandal, speciously implying a parallel with the one in 1982 when France sent Jean-Francois Larios home from the World Cup after he had been seeing Platini's wife. Thankfully the French legend was made of stronger stuff than to lower himself to those hacks' baiting, but seemed to lose patience eventually by replying 'I really don't care', which was met by applause by some non-Anglo writers. Platini did deflect a question about misbehaving rich stars by alluding to his plan to ban insolvent clubs from UEFA competitions. "What annoys me are the clubs who pay these high salaries when they don’t have the money," he made a point of telling the hall. Platini had started the press conference by referring to the continued uncertainly over the host nations' suitability in many eyes. "We are working on it...these things will develop," he semi-reassured the gathered media, whose experience of snowbound Warsaw has probably been a shock after the effortless charm of Vienna in the summer of 2008. After many deadlines, the eight venues are now at last "final" according to Platini, but o ne journalist still asked if Krakow, with its tourist infrastructure, might not yet replace one of the Ukrainian venues: The UEFA President said that was a matter for the national associations. The spread of stadia still looks daunting. In the media guide, train journey times are listed with the transfer between Gdansk and Donetsk taking a whopping 30hours at best... Then came the question of extra referees, with Platini defending his preference for more referees over more use of cameras. "I'm really a fan of the human method (of refereeing) rather than the technological method," he explained, adding he didn't want to let cameras run the officiating and noting that basketball had added extra officials over time. This led inevitably to Thierry Henry and Platini was quick to defend the referee in question from opprobrium: " The ref could not see a hand," he said. "It was a problem of refereeing rather than the referee – he is not to blame, though you could all see it on television." A rematch between the French and Irish in the qualifiers is one he would welcome, however. "Yes, I would love that," Platini smiled. In reality that would not produce anything like the sort of tension which led UEFA to extraordinarily add two political caveats to tomorrow's draw: Old enemies Armenia and Azerbaijan cannot meet each other and neither can Georgia and Russia, following their military fracas two years ago. The introduction of what he called "geopolitics" into football was interesting. Russia's looming presence as former guardian of Ukraine and the controller of Europe's gas supplies has allegedly been the reason Ukraine kept its hosting prize when it looks in no shape to be ready in time. "To avoid political problems, we don't want to mix sport up with politics," explained Platini, in self-conscious equivocation. What was that draw caveat if not political then? Platini has a lot on his plate all right, but seems well able to manage. Shortly having taken over the job from Lennart Johansson, Platini confessed, "I quickly realised I was dealing with different mindsets and different philosophies, from Siberia all the way to Portugal." 53 nations' coaches will assemble tomorrow in the Palace of Culture and Science, although Italy's Marcello Lippi will apparently not be there because he wants to watch Serie A games. Unusually, some qualifiers will be played on Fri/Tues instead of Sat/Weds for 2012, but otherwise the format is familiar with six graded pots of teams to select six groups of six and three of five. The nine group winners and best runners-up qualify automatically and the remaining eight runners-up have playoffs to decide four teams to go through. Poland and Ukraine qualify automatically as hosts. (c) Sean O'Conor & Soccerphile Tags Soccer News football

Here amid the palatial surroundings of the Palace of Culture and Science, a Stalinist skyscraper which towers over the Polish capital, UEFA President Michel Platini has just met the press ahead of tomorrow's UEFA 2012 Qualifying Draw . Platini's welcome to the tournament however w as slightly stained by repetitive questions from English journalists about the John Terry affair. Four separate reporters from football's homeland saw fit to probe him for his views on the matter, causing the UEFA President to eventually spout out, "Je m'en fous completement" - 'I really don't care!' The subtext to these interrogations was a similar case involving Platini in 1982. For the World Cup in Spain, midfielder Jean-Francois Larios had been picked for the French squad alongside his St Etienne teammate. Larios started France's opening 1-3 defeat to England, playing 73 minutes before being replaced by Jean Tigana, but was then promptly dropped by coach Michel Hidalgo after reports surfaced about an affair with Platini's wife. The resemblances to Terry's travails were too juicy a cherry for England's ta bloidy media to miss. But to tell the truth I felt embarrassed to be from the same country as them after they kept poking a man who was plainly was not going to take the bait. Expect Fabio Capello to be grilled on Terrygate rather than th e draw tomorrow. When the English tabloids choose to follow a story, they pursue it come what may. I can't stand Premier League press conferences where the clique of established hack s force their agenda through at the expense of a wider set of question s. Non Fleet Street reporters like me are frozen out with no time to ask what we want to: This is journalism rather than reporting. Today was supposed to be about Poland and the Ukraine's first chance to host a football tournament and the English hacks tried to make it about sex. I am on Platini's side: The football is just more interesting and i mpo rtant than the tittle-tattle. And I began to wonder whether this sort of dis-repecting the game contributes to England's wider lack of clout in global football politics. We are trying to p ersuade the world, or more specifically the 24 members of FIFA's Executive Committee , including a certain M.Platini, to back us for the 2018 World Cup, but our journalists are showing no respect to the FOOTBALL above all. "It's your problem in England," Platini finally said, half-exasperated. " I thought I had come here to talk about the Euros, not the problems of each country's media." Hear, hear. (c) Sean O'Conor & Soccerphile Tags Soccer News football

The UEFA u21 Championship gets slowly bigger every two years, but remains half in shadow, a curious sideshow to the bigger tournaments.

Over 100 scouts registered to attend the UEFA u21 Championship which has just finished in Sweden. Previous participants have included Raul, Luis Figo, Frank Lampard, Henrik Larsson, Eric Cantona and Zinedine Zidane. Here are the rising stars who caught my eye - #1 - MARCUS BERG, 22, Groningen & Sweden The hottest shot of the to urnament began with a hat-trick and ended with seven goals in four games. A class apart from his rivals with two deadly feet and immaculate off the ball running. What are the big clubs waiting for?

UEFA u21 Championship Final Germany 4:0 England Germany pricked the bubble surrounding Sturat Pearce's England u21s by blanking them 4-0 in the UEFA u21 final in Malmo. Werder Bremen's Mesut Ozil, one of the best midifielders in the tournament, was the ringleader of the tormentors as Pearce's dream of Euro glory once more foundered at Teutonic feet. Leading 1-0 at the interval from an almost copycat goal of the one they scored against England in Halmstad, the Germans sat back in the second half and let the Three Lions monopolise possession, but picked them off with three killer counter-attacks, which left the final score appear like a rout had happened. It had not. England enjoyed 60% of the ball and dominated proceedings in the second half, but had lost the verve they showed in the group stages and semi-final when leading Sweden 3-0 at half time. The yellow cards shown to Gabriel Agbonlahor, Fraizer Campbell and Joe Hart cost them dear in Malmo. With no recognisable strikers left, Theo Walcott, baptised star of the show before the first game, was left forlorn up front in the middle, unable to physically dominate the defenders around him and shorn of decent through-balls to sprint after. Then at the back, Watford's Scott Loach was a less than adequate replacement for Hart. He was wrong-footed for Ozil's swerving goal in the 48th minute and let Sandro Wagner's 79th minute strike fly through his legs. Germany however, played a tactically sound game, marked closely, defended en masse and did a textbook job in frustrating their more fancied opponents, waiting until England lost possession before raiding upfield. A surprise then, as Sweden, Belarus and Italy had looked more impressive than the Germans beforehand, and a devastating loss for England, who had looked all set from day one to bring home their first u21 trophy since 1984. After Italia '90 and Euro '96, Pearce's run of misfortune against the Germans goes on. GER - Castro 23' GER - Ozil 48' GER- Wagner 79' GER - Wagner 84' Germany- Neuer, Beck, Howedes, Boateng, Boenisch, Hummels (Aogo 83'), Johnson (Schwaab 68''), Castro, Khedira, Ozil (Schmelzer 89), Wagner.

UEFA u21 Championship Final, Malmo, Sweden England v Germany After a ding-dong semi final in which they threw away a three-goal lead before winning 5-4 on penalties, England return to Malmo for the final of the UEFA u21 Championship. Stuart Pearce will be missing three key players through suspension - goalkeeper Joe Hart and forwards Gabriel Agbonlahor and Fraizer Campbell, which means Theo Walcott should take on a central striking role against the Germans, who edged Italy 1-0 to reach the final.