Cardiff pips Dublin for Women's Champions League final

Ireland has missed out on hosting the 2029 Women's Champions League final after UEFA chose Cardiff's Principality Stadium over Dublin's Aviva Stadium.

A meeting of UEFA's executive committee took place on Tuesday, with the venue for the showpiece game on the agenda.

The Aviva was one of four stadiums looking to stage the event, going up against Cardiff, the Parc Olympique Lyonnais in France, and Basel's St Jakob-Park.

Dublin hosted the men's Europa League finals in 2011 and 2024, and with seven planned games at Euro 2028, the FAI were hoping to land another plum sporting occasion.

However they have been pipped by their Welsh counterparts.

UEFA also confirmed the Men's Champions League finals in 2028 and 2029 will be held in Munich's Allianz Arena and Barcelona's Nou Camp respectively. The 2028 Women's Champions League decider will be at Parc Olympic Lyonnais in Lyon.

FAI CEO David Courell said: "Congratulations to the Football Association of Wales on their successful bid for Cardiff to host the 2029 UEFA Women's Champions League final and thank you to UEFA for its positive feedback on the association's bid.

"The FAI's ambition to host this final was part of its ongoing commitment to supporting the development of women and girls' football and that will continue with participation levels at an all-time high, as well as more female coaches, match officials, administrators and volunteers helping to drive the game forward."

It's a disappointing outcome for the FAI but a coup for Limerick man Noel Mooney, the Football Association of Wales' chief executive officer.

"This is about much more than one night in 2029," he said.

"Our ambition is for the UEFA Women's Champions League final to become a catalyst for the continued transformation of women’s and girls’ football in Wales.

"Welsh football has made incredible progress. We have more than 20,000 women and girls playing the game, a growing domestic structure through the Adran Leagues and a Cymru team that has now competed on the major tournament stage. Bringing this final to Wales gives us another opportunity to accelerate that progress."

The UEFA Executive Committee also approved changes to the promotion/relegation format of the 2026/27 UEFA Nations League.

The Nations League will have three leagues instead of four from 2028/29.

There is a direct impact on the Republic of Ireland. If they were to finish bottom of their Nations League group in League B this year, they'd have a play-off to avoid relegation rather than go down automatically. The Boys in Green begin their campaign against Kosovo on Thursday, 24 September. Israel and Austria are the other countries in the group.

The League A/B play-offs will see the two lowest-ranked third-placed teams from League A, and the two highest-ranked fourth-placed teams from League A, go up against the four runners-up from League B.

For the League B/C play-offs the four fourth-placed teams from League B will face the four runners-up from League C.

The four group winners of League B are promoted to League A. The two lowest-ranked fourth-placed teams of Leagues A are relegated to League B.

The four winners of the League A/B play-off ties play in League A and the four defeated teams play in League B. The four group winners of League C are promoted to League B.

The four winners of the League B/C play-off ties play in League B and the four defeated teams play in League C. Since there will be no more League D, all league D teams are promoted to League C.

From 2028/29 onwards, the Nations League will consist of three leagues of 18 teams.

These will comprise three groups of six teams playing six matches against five different opponents: home or away against teams from different pots, home and away against the opponent of their same pot.

The next meeting of the UEFA Executive Committee will be held in Belfast on 7 December, the day after the Euro 2028 qualifying draw in the same city.

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