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By David Owen
April 1 – Geoff Thompson, the top English administrator in international football, is to play a key role next month in determining the host of the 2016 European Football Championship.
The former Football Association Chairman and current member of FIFA’s ruling Executive Committee is to chair the May 28 meeting in Geneva at which the choice of host nation will be made.
Thompson’s elevation comes because, with France and Turkey among the bidders along with Italy, neither Michel Platini, UEFA’s President, nor Senes Erzik, first Vice-President, are eligible to vote.
This leaves the Englishman as the highest-ranking vice-president able to take part.
It is conceivable, indeed, that Thompson himself could decide the winner, since the chair of the meeting holds a casting vote in the event of a tie.
Voting will take place in two, or possibly three stages.
In the first round, the 13 Executive Committee members eligible to take part - Italy’s Giancarlo Abete is also ineligible - will be asked to rank the three bidders in order of preference.
Bidders will garner one point for each third-placed ranking, two points per second-place and five points per first.
If the two countries with the fewest points are tied, an intermediate ballot will be held to decide which one is eliminated.
In the run-off, Executive Committee members will simply vote for their preferred choice among the two remaining candidates.
However, since abstentions are permitted, a tie is once again possible, meaning Thompson, as chair of the meeting, could be called upon to use his casting vote.
England is also represented via Lord Triesman, the current FA Chairman, on the National Team Competitions’ Committee charged with making recommendations to the Executive Committee following their assessment of the bid dossiers.
Triesman is not, though, among the four delegates of this body working with the UEFA administration and other experts to prepare evaluation reports on the bids.
Technical workshops are due to take place in each of the bidding countries from April 7.
The 2016 competition will be the first contested by 24 teams, up from 16 at present.
In addition to Thompson, the Executive Committee members eligible to vote in Geneva are: Angel María Villar Llona (Spain), Marios Lefkaritis (Cyprus), Joseph Mifsud (Malta), Allan Hansen (Denmark), František Laurinec (Slovakia), Avraham Luzon (Israel), Gilberto Madaíl (Portugal), Mircea Sandu (Romania), Grigoriy Surkis (Ukraine), Michael van Praag (Holland), Liutauras Varanavičius (Lithuania) and Theo Zwanziger (Germany).
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