ST. PETERSBURG, February 4. /TASS/. Russia’s second largest city of St. Petersburg expects to welcome about one million of football fans and tourists during matches of the 2020 UEFA Euro Cup this summer, St. Petersburg Vice Governor Vladimir Kirillov said on Tuesday.

"About one million fans visited us during matches of the [2018 FIFA] World Cup," Kirillov told journalists. "I believe that the figure will be the same for the European championship as well."

St. Petersburg will also offer two Fan Zones during the major European football championship and the main zone will be located on Konyushennaya Square while the other one, much smaller, on Palace Square.

Alexei Sorokin, the head of the Local Organizing Committee (LOC) Russia-2020, told TASS in December it was highly important for the Union of European Football Associations (UEFA) that a Fan-Zone would be opened on Palace Square in St. Petersburg for the 2020 UEFA Euro Cup. The Fan-Zone on Palace Square will be operational only for a limited period of time during the European football championship and, according to plans, it will serve as a platform for broadcasting of play-off matches between July 3 and 12.

The matches of the 2020 Euro Cup will be held at stadiums in 12 different cities across Europe, namely in London (England), Munich (Germany), Rome (Italy), Baku (Azerbaijan), Saint Petersburg (Russia), Bucharest (Romania), Amsterdam (The Netherlands), Dublin (Ireland), Bilbao (Spain), Budapest (Hungary), Glasgow (Scotland) and Copenhagen (Denmark) between June 12 and July 12, 2020.

Russia’s second largest city of St. Petersburg was granted the right to host three group stage matches and one of the quarterfinals of the 2020 UEFA Euro Cup. The newly-built football arena in St. Petersburg hosted the opening and final matches of the 2017 FIFA Confederations Cup and also served as one of 12 stadiums across the country hosting matches of the 2018 FIFA World Cup.

The over 62,300-seat capacity stadium was laid down in the western part of Krestovsky Island in St. Petersburg in 2007 and commissioned in early 2017. It serves as a home stadium for Zenit St. Petersburg football club.

A decision to hold the 2020 Euro Cup, which is celebrating its 60th anniversary this year, in various European countries instead of in one or two hosting countries was made at the UEFA Executive Committee’s meeting in Lausanne, Switzerland, on December 6, 2012.