Euro 2008 organisers confident successors will be ready

0 Comments | AFP, July, 2008

VIENNA (AFP) — Euro 2008 chief organiser Martin Kallen said Tuesday he was confident that Poland and Ukraine would be ready to stage the event without a hitch in 2012.

Both countries have been under pressure to deliver amid fears that they are lagging behind with logistical and infrastructural preparations, but Kallen, a Swiss, said he was "not worried."

"We were in the two countries at the start of July under UEFA president Michel Platini and it was a good trip," Kallen said.

Two weeks ago Poland's Prime Minister Donald Tusk and his Ukrainian counterpart Yulia Timoshenko pledged their countries will be ready, UEFA having chosen the neighbours as co-hosts for the quadrennial, 16-nation championships.

The choice raised eyebrows because neither the...