The Impact of a Sports Mega-Event on the International Image of a Country: the Case of Poland...

The Impact of a Sports MegaEvent on the International Image of aCountry: the Case of Poland Hosting UEFA Euro 2012

«The Impact of a Sports MegaEvent on the International Image of a Country: theCase of Poland Hosting UEFA Euro 2012»

by Agata Dembek; Renata Włoch

Source:Perspectives. Review of International Affairs (Perspectives. Review of International Affairs), issue: 1 /2014, pages: 3347, on www.ceeol.com.

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33Perspectives Vol. 22,No. 1 2014

The Impact of a SportsMega-Event on theInternational Imageof a Country: the Caseof Poland Hosting UEFAEuro 2012

AGATA DEMBEK AND RENATA WŁOCH

Abstract: The article examines the efficacy of the efforts to promote a country through its hosting

of a sports mega-event. It presents a preliminary analysis of the impact that Poland’s

hosting of UEFA Euro 2012 had on the perception of Poland in the eyes of the foreign

press. The results show that in spite of the underdeveloped branding strategy and sev-

eral promotional mishaps at the beginning of the tournament, Poland has benefited con-

siderably from organizing the event. A content analysis of press reports gathered around

the world by Polish embassies proves that the direct experience of the visitors of the

event, especially the journalists accredited at the championship, may have contributed

to changing the stereotypical image of Poland as a country of traditionalistic, fervently

Catholic farmers into an image of Poland as a quickly developing, aspiring and modern

European country.

Key words: international image of Poland, sports mega-event, UEFA Euro 2012, nation branding

INTRODUCTIONFor some time now, students of international relations and related disciplines whoare interested in the activities and evolution of the institution of the nation-state havebeen pointing out that in the context of a global capitalist economy driven by virtualfinancial flows, a significant transformation of the means of conducting the state’sexternal policy has taken place. Nowadays, states must wield not only ‘hard’ militaryor economic power, but also the ‘soft’ power of attractiveness and influence (Nye,2004). They must compete not only for recognition and regard on the part of otherstates, but also for the attention of potential investors, tourists, consumers of thegoods and services they produce and export, and the groups of potential immi-grants they wish to attract. This transformation has been described by the recently

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34 Perspectives Vol. 22,No. 1 2014

developed concepts of the competitive identity of a state (based on the attractive-ness of its exports, politics, culture, tourism, inhabitants and investment opportuni-ties) and country/nation branding (Anholt, 2007; Govers–Go, 2009), which areconceptually akin to but not identical with the traditional idea of public diplomacy(Szondy, 2008). The most simplified version of these concepts suggests that thestate should be considered as yet another type of product with its own unique brandthat should be accentuated and upheld by visual communication (e.g. a logo) and,more generally, by a complex marketing strategy. It must be duly noted that notabletheorists and researchers of the emerging field of country/nation/city/place/des-tination branding are making every effort to argue that the process of country imagemanagement is not an easy task and that the image of a country abroad is usuallyanchored in long-lived stereotypes, clichés, history and traditions, and, as such, it isnot easily or readily malleable (Anholt, 2007; Dinnie, 2009; Govers–Go, 2009;Kotler–Gertner, 2002).

For quite understandable reasons, the idea that it may be possible to change theimage of a country seems more alluring for those countries whose image is some-how negative or virtually non-existent in the eyes and minds of the international au-dience. The issue of international recognizability and attractiveness has gainedparticular importance for the relative ‘newcomers’ to international politics, such asPoland. Poland won its independence from the USSR in 1989; earlier its interna-tional image crudely came down to its being a country behind the Iron Curtain. Thefirst 15 years of its autonomic foreign policy were committed to leading the coun-try to join the Western European political structures (it joined NATO in 1999 and theEU in 2004). Meanwhile, it promptly dawned on the government to engage in thetask of promoting Poland in a rapidly globalizing environment. As will be describedbelow, similarly to the nation branding undertakings of other post-communist coun-tries, those efforts have not always been coherent or fully effective, which was dulyconfirmed by a variety of international ranking lists of country attractiveness(Surowiec, 2012).

These variable and modest promotional successes were one of the reasons whythe following occurred: when at the turn of 2004 the Ukrainian Football Associationmade its Polish counterpart the offer of a joint bid for organizing UEFA Euro 2012,the Polish government embraced the opportunity enthusiastically and provided allthe guarantees of the financially burdensome state for the UEFA. There is awidespread belief among the decision-makers of the states which are willing to hostsports mega-events that such undertakings will significantly contribute to enhancingthe state’s international image. They count on the idea that hosting such events willconfirm or improve their country’s status and image on the international arena, orsee it as an opportunity to signal their political and economic potential. Organizingor hosting a sports mega-event has always been considered a prestigious activity –

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THE IMPACT OF A SPORTS MEGA-EVENT


it may be appropriate to recall the international political friction concerning the or-ganization of the first FIFA Mundial in 1930, which was finally awarded to Uruguay– but in the era of globalization, as it seems, the stakes got higher. Sports mega-events offer a rare opportunity to present the state’s image in the global media; inother words, they provide international visibility (Cornellissen, 2007: 242;Rein–Shields, 2006). UEFA Euro is one of the most prestigious and well known globalmega-events, a marketing spotlight not only for companies that want to sell theirproducts by linking their brands with the UEFA’s Euro brand, but also for host states(Horne–Manzereiter, 2006). It provides a ‘showcase effect’ (Hiller, 1989: 119) – tele-vision exposure of the locality. In 2008, the European Championship had a TV au-dience of over 1 billion, with 150 million people watching every game (on average).This media exposure was particularly important for Poland – a country with a virtuallack of an international image.

This paper describes the international image of Poland before the 2012 Cham-pionship and the slow emergence of the country’s branding strategy (Surowiec,2012). In this context, it then presents the conclusions drawn from the most fun-damental findings of a qualitative analysis of media reports concerning the impactof UEFA Euro 2012 on the image of Poland; it must be noted that the analysis fo-cuses on the changed attitudes of foreign journalists, who are treated here as opin-ion-leaders who guard important communication channels. The frequency of themedia appearances of individual topics relating to the Championship shows thatspecial attention was paid to the political and historical conditions of Poland’s sit-uation as well as to organizational, promotional and economic issues. During thethree weeks of the Championship, Poland became a key subject of interest to theinternational media, which has given the country a chance to present itself frommany different angles. The observed change in the opinions expressed by the for-eign press may be regarded as an anticipation of a more general change in theimage of Poland abroad.

POLAND’S INTERNATIONAL IMAGE BEFOREUEFA EURO 2012: DIFFERENT SHADES OF GREYThe eagerness of the Polish authorities to combine their promotional activities withthe third most popular sports mega-event in the world was certainly strengthenedby the results of a research on the international image of Poland and Poles, whichhad been commissioned by various think-tanks and research and state agencies (theInstitute of Public Affairs, the Institute of the Polish Brand, the Ministry of Economy,PL.2012) in the previous years. Here we will briefly summarize its results while fo-cusing on the two most recent studies.

In most of the cases of the research, the given country’s opinion about Polandwas neutral, but in some countries negative attitudes towards it prevailed. When



asked about what kind of qualities they spontaneously connect with Poland, Euro-peans from other countries described it as a country cherishing tradition that is alittle backward, immersed in its difficult history, deeply religious (and with an ex-cessive influence of the Catholic Church) and agricultural (TNS OBOP, 2010). In an-other detailed study, the positive and neutral connotations of Poland in most of theresearched countries included the following: human capital (a cheap but well-ed-ucated and diligent labour force); food; history (especially World War II); a formercommunist country; a big country with a large market; agriculture, or an agriculturalcountry; the Polish cities (esp. in the UK and Ireland); vodka and alcohol; culture,tourism and holidays; the Solidarity movement and Lech Walesa (esp. in the USA);religiousness, Catholicism and John Paul II. The negative connotations includedthe following: nationalism; conservatism; an exaggerated Catholicism; a cold, sad,gloomy and boring country which should be pitied; thefts, thieves and corruption(esp. in Germany); a victim of a tough history; bad roads; Polish jokes; pirated prod-ucts and fakes; a far-away country that is not familiar and somehow closed to theexternal world (Ministry of Economy, 2011). It is additionally worth noting that theEuropeans generally have a better opinion of Poles than of Poland as such: theyare perceived as hard-working, willing to cope with adversities, creative and hos-pitable, though they are also seen as cunning and too conservative. Other nation-alities’ direct contacts with Poles who are or were travelling and/or working abroadare probably the main reason for the accelerated improvement of their interna-tional image.

Yet the most important – and uniform – general conclusion drawn from the vari-ety of studies conducted was as follows: the key problem of Poland is not a bad ornegative international image, but rather the lack of an international image. Most Eu-ropeans have a very meagre knowledge about Poland, if they have any knowledgeof it at all. Admittedly, over half of the respondents in the Czech Republic, Ukraine,Russia, and Germany knew something about Poland, but at the same time 82% ofthe Dutch, 72% of the British and 62% of the French know nothing or very littleabout the country (TNS OBOP, 2010). Information about Poland in foreign mediais scarce and it usually concentrates on politics and current affairs. The recognitionof Polish products, services and investment opportunities on the foreign markets islow, and the foreign general public does not receive much information about the Pol-ish economic success. Also, the Polish economy is not perceived as competitive(Ministry of Economy, 2011).

This low profile of Poland was further confirmed in international ranking lists ofcountry brands. In 2010, Poland took the 26th place on the list of 50 countries in theAnholt-Roper Nation Brand Index. In the 2011 Country Brand Index (which evalu-ates the strength, uniqueness and differentiation of a country brand in comparisonwith the brands of other countries) Poland – a country of 38 million, and an EU and



OECD member – took the 79th place out of 113 countries, and in the subgroup ofthe 33 European countries it was only in the 29th place (overtaking only Russia, Ser-bia, Romania and Ukraine).

The growing awareness of both the low profile of the Polish international imageand the importance of building a competitive identity for it had inspired Polish in-stitutions, and not only the governmental ones, to undertake numerous promotionalactivities. For a long time, such attempts were not very successful, and they were alsopoorly coordinated (NIK [Supreme Audit Office], 2011).

At the beginning of the 2000s there was an attempt to build a coherent com-munication for Poland with the help of the British branding guru Wally Olins. Agroup of experts from the Institute of the Polish Brand, working under his super-vision and drawing from their own research on the Polish image abroad, proposedthat the underpinning marketing line for Poland should be ‘creative tension’ (In-stitute of the Polish Brand, 2004). In the business lingo it may mean ‘a situationwhere disagreement or discord ultimately gives rise to better ideas or outcomes’.The term was to accentuate the fact that Poles are very traditional and yet quitemodern at the same time; they value religion, but also cherish liberty; they are atthe crossroads of the East and the West; they are idealists who can think prag-matically. The idea was never fully implemented: after the rightist party Prawo iSprawiedliwość’s electoral victory in 2005, Olins started to complain of the newgovernment policy, which he perceived as nationalist and intolerant. In 2007, hedeclared that ‘[a]t the moment there are far too many negative issues around them[i.e. PiS leaders]. In the present situation there is not a lot we can do to helpPoland’ (Telegraph, 2007). Nevertheless, the government used the Institute’s ex-pertise to create the tourism marketing strategy for 2008–2015 and the Commu-nication Strategy for the British, German and French markets (Institute of the PolishBrand, 2008). It may be safely claimed that Poland has not worked out a coherentnation branding strategy yet. Moreover, among the decision-makers there is noclarity in their use of concepts such as branding, promotion or communicationstrategy.

As of now, there are still a few dozen governmental and non-governmental insti-tutions working on the international image of Poland. To name but a few, the Min-istry of Foreign Affairs is responsible for the general image of Poland; the Ministryof Economy is responsible for the economic promotion of the country; the PolishAgency of Information and Foreign Investment is responsible for its foreign invest-ments; and the Polish Tourism Organization is naturally responsible for tourism. Acultural governmental agency – similar to the British Council and the Goethe Insti-tute – called the Institute of Adam Mickiewicz conducts various programs and ini-tiatives promoting Polish culture abroad. The diversity of those institutions hasunfortunately resulted in a lack of coherent communication. The Ministry of Foreign



Affairs’ Framework Strategy of Promotion, which was announced in 2009, enumer-ated, as a point of departure for future undertakings, some critical points in the pro-motional activities to date: the lack of cohesiveness and coordination of thepromotion; the lack of effective governmental support; the lack of legal, organiza-tional and financial instruments; the lack of methodology; and the lack of a clearcompetence division.

One of the ideas of the new Strategy was to accentuate the Polish presenceduring diverse cultural, economic and business mega-events, which were to betreated as ‘promotional anchors’ and perfect opportunities to influence targetedaudiences; these efforts, along with the preparations for the Polish EU presi-dency, were to be coordinated by the Department of Public and Cultural Diplo-macy. In 2010, Poland successfully participated in the EXPO in Shanghai, and inMarch 2011 it presented its new and – according to expert opinions – quite in-novative promotional campaign (Polska1 – Move Your Imagination) during ITBBerlin (Florek–Jankowska, 2012). Another such ‘promotional anchor’ was to bethe UEFA Euro 2012 tournament. As has already been mentioned, for the Polishauthorities the rationale for hosting the Championship was manifold. It was per-ceived as a for unique chance for a quickened infrastructural modernization, anopportunity for pulling its Ukrainian co-host closer to Europe, an occasion forgaining economically, and, naturally, an opportunity to advance Poland’s imagebefore the eyes of the international public. Surprisingly enough, PL.2012, thegovernmental agency responsible for the preparation process, which had pre-pared the research diagnosis for the promotional activities connected with theEuro and worked out the promotional strategy, did not implement the project,probably due to the lack of financing. Promotional activities connected with theEuro were composed into the overall promotional campaign ‘Move Your Imag-ination’, and it focused on the Polish cities and regions2. Additionally, each of thehost cities – Gdansk, Poznan, Warsaw and Wroclaw – carried out its own pro-motional campaign.

To sum it up, the Polish institutions did not manage to prepare a sufficiently co-herent promotional offensive in the international media that would be targeted at di-verse international audiences before the Championship. The hopes for thepromotion were based on a strategy of influencing the people who would visitPoland during the Championship (especially journalists) and get to know the coun-try and its inhabitants – as a result of this influence, they would change their previ-ous opinions of Poland. As the official website of PL.2012 states, ‘Each person visitingPoland during UEFA EURO 2012™ should leave our country with an impression thatPoland is a normal European country, where cool and open people live’. This is whyvisitors to the country were greeted with a poster campaign with the catchword‘Feel like at home’. The modesty of this above cited goal proves – on the one hand



– the authorities’ awareness of the low profile of Poland’s international image, and– on the other hand – the belief in its inadequacy.

THE METHODOLOGY OF THE RESEARCHThe presented examination of the impact of UEFA Euro 2012 on the Polish inter-national image is illustrated by an analysis of 25 bulletins of the Polish Ministry ofForeign Affairs prepared between June 6th and July 7th in 2012 and based on 800press notes from over 20 countries. The bulletins were prepared for the internaluse of the Polish administration; they presented and summed up the informationconcerning Poland and EURO 2012 as it appeared in the local press. They werebased on both news press notes and journalistic articles. It must be noted that themethodological adequacy of the research material had its inherent limitations.The reports were of diverse character (they differed in length and depth) andtherefore could not be treated as a uniform research sample and the basis of amore consistent quantitative analysis. Nevertheless, the researchers assumed thatthe material provided by the Ministry was unique in terms of its scope and diver-sity and that therefore it may be treated as a handy illustrative basis for the pre-liminary analysis of the changes in the international image of Poland, even thoughthe subject will need further elaboration based on a more coherent research sam-ple. Additionally, the goals of the study focused on the international perception ofPoland’s image in general rather than on a discourse analysis. The embassy pressreports were analysed qualitatively in order to identify the most often elaboratedthemes and issues: the vast majority of the reports dwelled on the difference be-tween the expected and the experienced outlook of Poland, and the behaviour ofthe football fans.

LAPSING INTO STEREOTYPES?As presented above, for the Polish authorities UEFA Euro 2012 was a once-in-a-life-time opportunity to advertise their country to the world. Yet even before the open-ing of the Championship their hopes suffered several serious strokes. The firstmajor blow was triggered by the co-hosting Ukraine, which was then undergoingits gravest political crisis since the Orange Revolution. The imprisonment of itsformer Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko evoked an outrage among the Europeanpolitical elite and commentators, who started to denounce the lack of democracyand transparency in Ukraine. Several of the top European politicians declared thatthey would not condone the situation by attending the games. The affair thus stolesome of the spotlight from Poland as most of the attention of the European mediawas focused on Ukraine. There was also a risk that some of the odium would falldown on the neighbouring Poland, which, despite the much more advanced andsturdy state of its democracy and civil society, would often be lumped together



with other post-Communist East European countries. Yet surprisingly enough, themajority of the foreign media reports during the Championship strictly distin-guished between Ukraine and Poland to the advantage of the latter. They elabo-rated on Poland’s modernizing advancement, which stood in contrast to thesituation of the Eastern neighbour, and Poland was perceived as a fully European,developed and dynamic country. A fly in the ointment worth underlining, though,is that the two countries did not succeed in the task of co-organizing the event asa common one. When the preparation, atmosphere and organizational quality ofthe Championship were evaluated by foreign journalists, they mostly evaluatedPoland and Ukraine separately.

Another ‘PR car crash’ was caused by the BBC documentary titled Stadiums ofHate, which aired on 3 June, just before the start of the Championship. It describedPoland and Ukraine as countries penetrated by racism and anti-Semitism. In thedocumentary, examples of racist football hooliganism were commented on by SolCampbell, a former British footballer: ‘I know it was like this in England at one stage[just a little over 20 years ago, in fact] but in the 21st century, this is on a completelydifferent level.’ He went to say that ‘the tournament should never have been givento these countries’ and advised British football fans not to go there as there was adanger that they ‘might come back in a coffin’. The film became a reference pointfor all the narratives about the Championship: even if it was criticized and its the-ses were falsified, they were first described and discussed. The media narrativesabout the problem of the racist and xenophobic behaviour of football fans at thestadiums and in the Fan Zones during the tournament referred to the problem ofracism, xenophobia and anti-Semitism in the Polish society as such. Poland wasportrayed as a country specifically ridden with such problems, especially in the UKand in the non-European countries, particularly in South Africa, Malaysia, Indone-sia and India. However, at the end of the Championship foreign media began to ver-ify the racist image of Poland, stressing that the worries were much exaggerated ornot confirmed at all, and that according to the first-hand experience of the foreignjournalists, football fans, coaches, footballers and VIPs, Poland has no more prob-lems with racist football hooligans than most other countries. Media reports widelyelaborated on the event prepared by English fans in Donetsk (Ukraine) on June19th, which was a critical answer to Campbell’s statement. By this gesture, the fansstressed that their personal experience of the Championship’s atmosphere hadbeen very positive, and that it was actually unlike the BBC documentary’s warn-ings. International media also noted the announcements of the English Football As-sociation’s complaint against the BBC for airing Stadiums of Hate. According tothe FA, the airing of the misleadingly alarming documentary just before the Cham-pionship had been a reason for the low attendance of English fans during the gamesin Poland and Ukraine.



The third promotional blow was created by the fights that erupted in Warsaw on12 June – on the day of the game between Poland and Russia – between Polish andRussian football fans. As a result, more than 180 people were arrested and the eventswere widely commented on in the international media. From 12 June, a lion’s shareof the media narrations was devoted to the descriptions and explanations of theclashes. Interestingly, foreign journalists readily inscribed them in the logic of thehistoric hate between the two nations, which was rooted in the Tsarist era and deep-ened in the period of the harsh Soviet domination after 1945. The evaluation of theWarsaw events was determined by geopolitical predilections. The commentaries ofthe Russian media usually blamed the Polish side for providing inadequate securitymeasures. One of the Russian newspapers wrote that the fights were ‘a kind of geno-cide’3; another wrote about the hostile atmosphere surrounding the Russians at thestadiums, ‘a foul campaign of hate carried by the Polish media towards the Russians’and ‘the Polish sport nationalism’. The Belarusian press reminded the Polish that the‘Red Army liberated Poland from the Teutonic aggression’. Also the Bulgarian,Kazakh and Iranian media, along with the Lithuanian media, blamed the Polish sidefor the conflicts. But on the other hand, the German press, for example, much moreoften emphasized the provocative character of the march organized in Warsaw bythe Russian football fans and the banners on the stadiums that reminded one of thePolish bashing in Russia in the 17th century. In many of the commentaries the tensePolish-Russian relations were compared to the pragmatic and friendly Polish-Ger-man relations, in which the dramatic history between the two nations has been suc-cessfully overcome. It is also worth underlining that the majority of the reportsadmitted that the atmosphere of threat and anxiety created in the media before thePoland-Russia game had been significantly exaggerated. Furthermore, the Polish po-lice and security forces were praised for their efficiency and professionalism in han-dling the conflicts. Commentaries argued that similarly to the case of the racism atthe stadiums, in this case, the anticipated level of threats was much higher than theactual level of threats.

Apart from the narratives connected to the three aforementioned issues, the qual-itative analysis showed that generally the media in most countries, especially at thebeginning of June, described the events during the tournament and the presentationof the Polish host according to the functioning stereotypes about Poland, as identi-fied in the research concerning its international image. One of the common themeswas the historic narration. Quite often journalists from countries such as Greece,Thailand, Germany, Saudi Arabia, the UK, Luxemburg, India, Kenya, Korea, Turkeyor Lithuania, to name but a few, accentuated that ‘EURO is a lesson of the Polish his-tory’. The press notes from the host cities were quite similar in character: Warsaw wasdescribed through the prism of the painful WWII history, the Warsaw Uprising andthe catastrophic destruction of the city; Gdansk, Wroclaw, Poznan and Krakow



(which was not a host city, but a training centre for the English team) were describedas cities with a multifaceted and multicultural past. At the same time, the quite oftensorrowful past was contrasted to the modern present. Poland was shown as a coun-try with a rich tradition and a complicated history, but also as a quickly developingentity. It is worth noting that the more distant the country that commented on Polandwas, the more simplified the media narratives of Poland were. For example, in JapanPoland and Ukraine were described as countries that are dazzled by their past mis-eries and their feeling of having suffered injustices in the past. Also, in the interna-tional media, plenty of attention was given to the visits of the football teams – notsurprisingly, particularly to the visit of the German team – to the Auschwitz-Birkenaucamp. This gesture was particularly important for the Polish authorities, as the campsare sometimes incorrectly referred to by the international media as ‘the Polish con-centration/death camps’ – which is harmful to the Polish international image.

Another common theme that was readily taken up by the foreign media was the‘uncommon’ religiousness of the Polish society. Poland was presented as a deeplyCatholic country, especially in Austria (Poland as a nation of ‘John Paul II fans’), theCzech Republic (a Czech commentator stated that Polish fans would seek solace inchurches after the defeat of their team) and Ireland (the idea that the Irish share acommunity of religion with the Poles). Journalists wrote about the activities under-taken by the Catholic Church during the Championship, such as the masses heldfor foreign football fans in the host cities, the promotional action that was intendedto attract potential future priests and used the slogan ‘Join God’s team’, and theconfession of one of the Church dignitaries that he had prayed for the Polish goalie.

All in all, the analysis of the foreign media reports concerning UEFA Euro 2012 inPoland proves that the task of modifying a country’s international image is always adifficult one. In this case, the media readily lapsed into using sets of already existingstereotypes, particularly when faced with events that easily fitted them, such as thePolish-Russian brawls on 12 June, or when sensitized, even if to a large extent falsely,to phenomena such as racism and anti-Semitism. Probably because of this ‘stereo-typical filter’ through which Poland was seen by foreign journalists especially at thebeginning of the Championship, the tone of the commentaries has been distinctlychanging throughout the duration of the tournament. Despite all the presupposi-tions described above, UEFA Euro 2012 has shown Poland to the world from quitea different angle.

A CHAMPIONSHIP OF SURPRISESAs noted above, the stereotypical image of Poland and the Polish society was thestarting point for most of the press comments. But another strong pattern identi-fied within the qualitative analysis of the media reports was an element of aston-ishment. To the foreign journalists’ surprise, Poland proved to be a welcoming,



well-organized and safe place inhabited by open and friendly people. The atmo-sphere of surprise in the analysed texts had been steadily increasing throughoutthe Championship’s duration – the more time foreign journalists spent in Polandand the more experiences they gathered, the more explicitly they verified their ini-tial point of view.

The atmosphere of the event was described as created above all by emotions,particularly by enthusiasm and hospitality. Journalists, players and fans almost unan-imously emphasized the welcoming Polish approach towards the visitors. The Pol-ish volunteers were depicted as cordial and professional, and the Polish people asopen and helpful. The friendly and joyful atmosphere was noted even by the Russianmedia, which generally focused on the conflicts between the Polish and Russianfans and critically evaluated the organizational aspects of the tournament. Especiallyafter the Polish team dropped out of the tournament, the lasting enthusiasm of thePoles was depicted as unusual. The Czech press, for instance, was pleasantly sur-prised by the support given by Polish fans to the team that had eliminated their play-ers from the competition. Also, the warm welcome for the German team wasfrequently underlined and recognized as a proof of the two countries overcomingtheir historical antagonisms.

The element of surprise was also present in the reports on the organizational as-pect of UEFA Euro 2012. It was particularly significant as the anticipations had notbeen positive: the foreign press had not really believed in Poland’s ability to dealwith the major organizational challenge (‘there is no point in expecting much fromthe host that is not a G8 member’). However, the final evaluation revealed that thestandards for organizing Euro 2012 were at least equally high as those for previoussimilar events. The main organizational successes underlined by the journalists werethe following: the work of the police and municipal services, the preparation of ac-commodation centres for the teams and guests, and – above all – the quality of thenewly built Polish stadiums. From the perspective of Poland’s international image, itis worth emphasizing the tone of surprise in reports regarding the order and tidinessof Polish cities. Apparently, the level of expectations in this area was relatively lowbefore the Championship.

From the beginning of June, one of the dominant topics in foreign media reportson the games was the subject of safety and public order during the event. The threatof hooligan riots, the problem of racism and the anticipated poor preparation of thepolice and municipal services were widely discussed by the foreign press. This toneof anxiety, however, subsided after the much dreaded game between Poland andRussia, when it appeared that the security forces stood up to the challenge. Theanalysis shows that from this moment on, the character of the reports significantlychanged. For instance, the American and Canadian media admitted that the previ-ous estimation of the level of the threats had been considerably exaggerated. In the



summarizing media reports at the end of the month, the Championship was evalu-ated as safe and calm.

The majority of the summarizing reports stressed the organizational and promo-tional success of Poland and argued that Poland’s hosting of the UEFA Euro 2012event would be an important impulse for the growth of the business and touristic ex-change between Poland and other countries. At the end of the day, foreign jour-nalists evaluated Poland as a modern and ‘serious’ European country, and itsstereotypical image has gradually weakened in their eyes over the course of theChampionship’s duration.

DIRECT EXPERIENCE AS A PROMOTIONALSTRATEGYOne of the most interesting patterns identified in the conducted analysis was thepositive relation between visiting Poland in person and the tone of the opinions pro-fessed in the media. The level of sympathy and enthusiasm for Poland was signifi-cantly higher in the comments and opinions of those journalists who actually visitedPoland during the Championship. Also the strength of the ‘surprise effect’ was in-creased in those cases. This can be explained by a basic psychological mechanism– a direct experience provokes more intense affective reactions than an indirect one(Cialdini–Petty–Cacioppo, 1981). But the fact that the experiences described in theanalysed media reports were mostly positive can be considered as an importantcase in projecting the Poland brand’s strategy.

Not surprisingly, the journalists’ accounts from their trips to Poland were alsomuch more detailed and filled with different examples. Polish cities were describedas both unexpectedly modern and peculiarly calm and diverse. The foreign opticshad also allowed them to enumerate some characteristics of the Polish people otherthan their stereotypical traditional hospitality and religiousness. The Poles have beendescribed as very open and caring but also dynamic and tolerant, and the Polishfootball fans were described as fun-loving people who were willing to cheer on theteams that had defeated their national football representation. These examples showthe strength of the direct personal experience as a tool for changing the petrifiedimage of Poland that was built on an indirect and mostly historical basis (Govern–Go,2009).

CONCLUSIONSThe case of Poland may be treated as exemplary by other countries which wouldconsider hosting a sports mega-event and using it as a promotional vehicle. ButPoland’s preparation for the Championship demanded a tremendous effort in termsof financing and organization: estimates state that Poland invested approximately€ 24 billion in sports facilities and infrastructure. Additionally, the Polish authorities



had to negotiate the sovereignty of the state by granting the powerful organizerUEFA a series of commercial and intellectual property rights, fiscal privileges andguarantees. Like all other hosts of sports mega-events, Poland cherished high hopesas to the political, economic and social revenues from the event. Yet, as John Horneobserved, megaprojects seem to be a kind of a ‘fantasy world of underestimatedcosts, overestimated revenues, underestimated environmental impacts and over-val-ued economic development effects’ (2007: 86). The main question remains as towhether there are reasons to believe that Poland will benefit from UEFA Euro 2012in terms of its international image.

Polish authorities assumed that the sheer presence of their country in the inter-national media would enhance its visibility and contribute to changing its image. Itmay be safely concluded that this aim has been achieved to a reasonable extent: itis estimated that Euro 2012, jointly with the qualification round, had an audience of1.1 billion viewers via 55 thousand hours of TV transmission in 220 countries aroundthe world. Poland’s name was frequently mentioned in the broadcasts, and it is notto be ignored that it was connoted with the powerful brand of UEFA and, in general,with all the strong emotions connected with football.

In reference to the other goal, it is worth reminding ourselves that on the eve ofthe Championship Poland could not boast of having a mature and well-preparedpromotional campaign or a well thought out branding strategy. Infrastructural prepa-rations consumed most of the budget to the detriment of promotional issues. As aresult, the promotional campaign was limited in scope and range (it was limitedmainly to the three countries identified as crucial for the Polish tourist sector, that is,France, Germany and the UK), and the promotional insight was based on the ideaof changing the image of Poland through personal experiences and reports of visi-tors, particularly those of the journalists accredited at the event. The first part of theanalysis of the press reports showed that in their writing about Poland the journal-ists readily employed long-existing, vague and historically conditioned stereotypes.Thus, it is important that the potential host countries for megaevents prepare a de-tailed diagnosis of their current international image, so that the authorities couldevade or control potential promotional crises (such as the racism issue in the caseof Poland) and be ready to take countermeasures against them. Yet the second partof the analysis showed how the direct experience of the so-called opinion leaders –In this case, the journalists – might potentially lead to a change in the establishedimage of a country. Undoubtedly, the ‘effect of surprise’, which is based on a clashbetween expectations and reality, may be counted as one of the most importantbenefits that Poland drew from organizing the Championship. Poland’s paying at-tention to – and earmarking money for – the soft, social and logistical aspects ofthe sports mega-event that hugely enhanced the comfort of the visitors (such as thequality of the volunteering and the professional support for the journalists) instead



of investing massively in a costly promotional campaign has apparently been a goodstrategy.

ENDNOTES1 The term is Polska, not Poland, as Poland is often confused with Holland. This was another creative idea

of Wally Olins.2 The well-received promotional spots of the Move Your Imagination campaign may be watched on

YouTube at http://www.youtube.com/user/polandtravel?v=jXPeofkW-Pw&lr=1.3 All the quotes that are not specifically identified come from the analyzed media contents provided by

the Polish embassies.

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