The Union of European Football Associations), is the administrative body for association
football in Europe and part of Asia.
It is one of six continental confederations of world football's governing body FIFA.
UEFA consists of 54 national association members.
UEFA represents the national football associations of Europe, runs nation and club competitions
including the UEFA European Championship, UEFA Champions League, UEFA Europa League,
and UEFA Super Cup, and controls the prize money, regulations, and media rights to those
competitions.
UEFA was founded on 15 June 1954 in Basel, Switzerland after consultation between the
Italian, French, and Belgian associations.
Initially, the European football union consisted of 25 members which number doubled by the
early 1990s.
UEFA membership coincides for the most part with recognition as a sovereign country in
Europe, although there some exceptions.
Some micro states, are not members.
Some UEFA members are not sovereign states, but form part of a larger recognised sovereign
state in the context of international law.
Examples include England and Scotland, or the Faroe Islands, however in the context
of these countries government functions concerning sport tend to be carried at the territorial
level coterminous with the UEFA member entity.
Some UEFA members are transcontinental states,.
Several Asian countries were also admitted to the European football association, particularly
Israel and Kazakhstan, which had been members of the Asian football association.
Additionally some UEFA member associations allow teams from outside their association's
main territory to take part in their "domestic" competition.
Monaco, for example, takes part in the French League; Welsh clubs Cardiff City and Swansea
City participate in the English League; Berwick Rangers, situated in England, play in the
Scottish Professional Football League and Derry City, situated in Northern Ireland,
play in the Republic of Ireland-based League of Ireland .
Until 1959 the main headquarters were located in Paris, and later in Bern.
Since 1995, UEFA headquarters transferred to Nyon, Switzerland.
Henri Delaunay was the first general secretary and Ebbe Schwartz the first president.
The current president is Michel Platini.
Members
Notes
Former members Saarland Football Union 1954–1956
German football association of the German Democratic Republic 1954–1990
Football Federation of the Soviet Union 1954–1991, in 1992 became Russian Football Union.
The newly independent 14 Soviet Republics created their own football associations, and
they all became members of FIFA and UEFA or AFC.
Football Association of Yugoslavia 1954–1992, became Football Association of Serbia and
Montenegro.
Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia, Macedonia and Slovenia became independent and created
their own football associations.
Football Association of Serbia and Montenegro 1992–2006, became Football Association of
Serbia.
Montenegro, which became independent, created its own football association.
Competitions UEFA runs official international competitions
in Europe and some countries of Northern, Southwestern and Central regions of Asia for
national teams and professional clubs, known as UEFA competitions, some of them regarded
between the world's most prestigious tournaments.
International The main competition for men's national teams
is the UEFA European Football Championship, started in 1958, with the first finals in
1960, and known as the European Nations Cup until 1964.
It is also called UEFA or the EURO.
UEFA also runs national competitions at Under-21, Under-19 and Under-17 levels.
For women's national teams, UEFA operates the UEFA Women's Championship for senior national
sides as well as Women's Under-19 and Women's Under-17 Championships.
UEFA also organized the UEFA-CAF Meridian Cup with CAF for youth teams.
In an effort to boost youth soccer.
UEFA launched the UEFA Regions' Cup, for semi-professional teams representing their local region, in
1999.
In futsal there is the UEFA Futsal Championship and UEFA Futsal Under-21 Championship.
Italian, German, Spanish and French men's national teams are the sole to have won the
European football championship in all categories.
Club
The top-ranked UEFA competition is the UEFA Champions League, which started in the 1992/93
season and gathers the top 1–4 teams of each country's league; this competition was
re-structured from a previous one that only gathered the top team of each country.
A second, lower-ranked competition is the UEFA Europa League.
This competition, for national knockout cup winners and high-placed league teams, was
launched by UEFA in 1971 as a successor of both the former UEFA Cup and the Inter-Cities
Fairs Cup.
A third competition, the Cup Winners' Cup, which had started in 1960, was absorbed into
the UEFA Cup in 1999.
In women's football UEFA also conducts the UEFA Women's Champions League for club teams.
The competition was first held in 2001, and known as the UEFA Women's Cup until 2009.
The UEFA Super Cup pits the winners of the Champions League against the winners of the
UEFA Europa League, and came into being in 1973.
The UEFA Intertoto Cup was a summer competition, previously operated by several Central European
football associations, which was relaunched and recognized as official UEFA club competition
by UEFA in 1995.
The last Intertoto Cup took place in 2008.
The Intercontinental Cup was jointly organised with CONMEBOL between the Champions League
and the Copa Libertadores winners.
Only four teams have won each of the three main competitions, a feat that is no longer
possible for any team that did not win the Cup Winners' Cup.
There are currently nine teams throughout Europe that have won two of the three trophies;
all but one have won the Cup Winners Cup, four require a win in the Champions League
and five require a UEFA Europa League win.
Juventus of Italy was the first team in Europe—remaining the only one to date—to win all UEFA's official
championships and cups and, in commemoration of achieving that feat, have received The
UEFA Plaque by the Union of European Football Associations on 12 July 1988.
UEFA's premier futsal competition is the UEFA Futsal Cup, a tournament started in 2001 which
replaced the former Futsal European Clubs Championship.
This event, despite enjoying a long and well-established tradition in the European futsal community,
dating back to 1984, was never recognized as official by UEFA.
Sponsors The UEFA Champions League current main sponsors
are: Nissan
Gazprom Heineken
MasterCard Sony Computer Entertainment EuropePlayStation
is the brand advertised.
UniCredit HTC
The UEFA Europa League current main sponsors are:
Hankook, Western Union
Socar HTC.
Adidas is a secondary sponsor and supplies the official match ball and referee uniform
for all UEFA competitions.
Konami's Pro Evolution Soccer is also a secondary sponsor as the official Champions League video
game.
League revenues
Annual revenue comparison.
All figures in Euros.
Source is the Deloitte 2013 annual report, which uses 2011–12 figures.
See also Competitions
Resolutions Major non-UEFA competitions
Financial Fair Play UEFA Financial Fair Play Regulations
See also
Timeline of football List of Presidents of UEFA
CONMEBOL CONCACAF
Confederation of African Football Asian Football Confederation
Oceania Football Confederation World Cup Participation and results
Legend 1st – Champion
2nd – Runner-up 3rd – Third Place
4th – Fourth place QF – Quarterfinals
R16 – Round of 16 R2 – Second round
GS – Group Stage 1S – First Knockout Stage
• — Did not qualify × — Did not enter / Withdrew / Banned
— Hosts Men
Women FIFA Confederations Cup
Legend 1st – Champions
2nd – Runners-up 3rd – Third place
4th – Fourth place GS – Group stage
•• — Qualified / Invited, but declined to take part
• — Did not qualify × — Did not enter / Withdrew from continental
championship / Confederation did not take part
Q — Qualified for upcoming tournament — Hosts
References
External links Official website
Union of European Football Association, Soccerlens.com.
Retrieved: 9 October 2010.