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Ministers will this morning officially back bringing the Euro 2028 soccer tournament here.
A joint Cabinet memo is being brought by Minister for Tourism, Catherine Martin, and Minister for Sport, Jack Chambers, looking for Government approval.
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And once the backing is received - the decision by ministers is expected to be unanimous - the Government will formally submit its joint bid with the other Home Nations to UEFA ahead of the official deadline tomorrow.
Government sources are extremely confident that the hosting alongside Northern Ireland, Scotland, England and Wales will be successful.
This is because the other known rivals in the bidding process have been ruled out and applications close tomorrow.
Russia has been blocked by UEFA from submitting a bid, Turkey has now withdrawn a bid and Italy has decided to chase the 2032 hosting rights instead.
It leaves the bid Ireland is involved in as ‘last man standing.’
A senior source at the Department of Tourism and Sport told the Irish Mirror that the Government’s official seal would be “a strong indicator of intent and expectation” for UEFA.
Soccer fans here were left devastated when the Euro 2020 tournament that was supposed to be jointly-staged here was postponed in 2020 because of Covid.
The disappointment was then compounded when the Government decided that it was not safe for Dublin to take its place as one of 13 host cities in the rescheduled games last Summer.
The competition did go ahead when there were still major international concerns over Covid.
The English FA came in for heavy criticism after the final was played in Wembley to a packed stadium.
There was a Covid spike directly linked to the final with NHS testing and tracing finding over 2,200 cases that could be traced back to that single match.
UEFA will formally announce the bid(s) received on April 5th and then the bid with the necessary technical detail must be lodged with the soccer governing body by next Spring.
But a source close to the Government’s bidding process told the Mirror last night that “it is looking more likely than not that the joint Uk and Ireland bid may be the sole bidder for Euro 2028.”
The hosting would be a boon for the domestic tourism industry with estimates that there would be 147,000 international visitors outside the UK coming to the tournament.
Fans will spend millions when they come here and the source said the Government will support the bid through "funding for venues, transport, security and fan zones."
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