I wonder... Cracow's kinda the jewel among Poland's cities. Former capital, second-largest city and a tourist mecca. So how come other cities won out? Is it because of Cracow's unsavoury fans? Stadium issues?
Don't know but the Dutch team took over the town and its stadium. Yesterday they had 20,000 Dutch supporters attend the open training! Some great videos here: http://www.youtube.com/onsoranje
Actually, seems that the English and Italians are also staying in the city and each is using a different stadium. The Dutch use the biggest one.
The truth is that no one really knows. It's not stadium issues, as Wisla's stadim has recently been modernized and is not any worse than the four that will be hosting. Maybe it is the fans; the rivalry between Cracovia and Wisla fans is by far the most fiery, and deadly in Poland, and UEFA and PZPN wanted to avoid an major embarrassment. Krakow is also know as a party destination, especially with English tourists, yet the city prides itself on being the cultural and intellectual capital of Poland, so perhaps they did not want to project that "party" image to the world.
Or maybe it's simply because Krakow is the most well-known city of Poland.The one that attracts the most tourists and also the one, for me, with the best infrastructures & transports and the government & the polish federation wanted to develop and put into the spotlight the other big polish cities. Poland is probably the country who is changing the most in Europe right now, the economy is growing quite fast and now they have this big opportunity. It wasn't easy as there was a lot to do and they were lacking experience for this kind of events but they did great. And maybe they told themselves they were gonna spend the money on the others cities who were to be honest a lot behind Krakow in all the things i mentioned. This is a very subjective point of view of course as i have only been in Poland for a few months at different time of my life But for me, if you know others cities need it more and that the billions which have to be spendt would be better spent somewhere else, to cut off the city that most people see as the real capital of Poland, a bit like Istanbul, Rio & Sydney for Turkey, Brazil & Australia , was a very brave decision.
It is considerably smaller than the other Polish venues though, is it not? They seem to hold around 40,000 or so, while Wisla's new place holds just over 30000.
I bet that played a significant role in the decision-making. Yeah, Cracovians tend to look down upon upstart Warsaw. And with two big teams in town, they're getting their EURO vibe of sorts on the cheap. Is there an official fan-zone there? And well, I guess Cracow doesn't need the tournament to "make it on the map". It already is a well-known city beyond Poland's borders. Not that I think Poznan needed a boost either. Seems like a prosperous and attractive city. Nor does Gdansk, I dare say, but I haven't made it there myself. Now, Lodz sure could have done with some love!
Dutch players were met with racist monkey noises at open training session in Cracow. Horrible. Sad. Quite unlike the awesome welcome the German team was given in Danzig. From the Guardian:
I think it was a little bit of all of what everyone here suggested. Issue is political, but also the cities chosen offer tourism and infrastructure to other parts of Poland. Gdansk is a much host city because of its charms, tourist capabilities, historical significance, and the different aspect it offers from the other cities.
According to Dutch press today the reports of "monkey chants" at the Netherlands first training session are not true. "Volkskrant"; Leugens.nl. According to those sources they were made up/exaggerated/perhaps even staged by De Telegraaf, an anti-immigrant/anti-Polish Dutch paper.
Source? Sure you're doing justice to De Telegraaf with that "anti-immigrant/anti-Polish" characterisation? I have a hard time believing the Netherlands' leading broadsheet (I trust) can be described as such.
Sources are Volksrant and Leugens.nl. In addition, Polish press today reports that the Krakow police analyzed the tapes thoroughly and did not find any racist chants at all, just vulgar songs and chants by a group of about 12 people directed at rival team, Cracovia.