Traditional rivals Germany and Netherlands will face one another in a tough group at the 2012 European football championship, Friday night's draw in Kiev indicated.

The draw also pitted holders and world champions Spain against Italy with France facing England and co-hosts Ukraine.

The event, the third biggest in global sport after the World Cup and Olympic Games, starts with a reminder of when outsiders Greece gatecrashed the opening day party of 2004 hosts Portugal with a 2-1 win on their way to a stunning tournament triumph.

"I hope that does not happen again, we would not want to experience what Portugal experienced on the first day of Euro 2004," Poland coach Franciszek Smuda told reporters looking ahead to the June 8 game in Warsaw, as cited by Firstpost.

The flesh was put on the bones of the biggest sporting event to take place in eastern Europe since the 1980 Moscow Olympics when the 16 finalists were drawn into four groups for the competition which runs from June 8 to July 1 next year.

More than 1.4 million visitors are expected to come to Poland and Ukraine and sample the delights of cities as far apart as Gdansk in northern Poland and Donetsk in southern Ukraine, separated by a distance of around 2,500 kilometres.

As well as facing Greece in Group A, Poland will also meet eastern European rivals Russia in Warsaw and the Czech Republic in Wroclaw.

Sweden, England and France are in Group D with Ukraine playing their first game against the Swedes in their capital Kiev on June 11.

England will meet France on the same day in Donetsk and the French will be hoping for the same outcome as when they played each other in their opening match of Euro 2004 in Lisbon, two late goals earning Les Bleus a 2-1 win.

Ukraine coach Oleg Blokhin said: "What can you say apart from you will never face easy opposition in the Euros so whoever we played, it was going to be a challenge. But our stadiums are ready, our people are ready and the players will be ready."

Group B brought together four strong opponents in the toughest-looking pool with Netherlands, Germany, Denmark and Portugal all renewing old rivalries.

The rivalry between the Germans and the Dutch has evolved into one of the most intense in international soccer dating from the 1974 World Cup final when the then West Germany beat hot favourites Netherlands 2-1 in the final in Munich.

The Dutch gained a modicum of revenge when they beat West Germany 2-1 in the semi-final of Euro '88 in Hamburg before going on to be crowned European champions back in Munich.

The draw was conducted by UEFA general secretary Gianni Infantino at Kiev's Palace of Arts before a crowd of invited guests and soccer celebrities.

He was assisted by four former European champions, Zinedine Zidane of France, Dutch ace Marco Van Basten, Danish goalkeeper Peter Schmeichel and German striker Horst Hrubesch.

The finals will be the third to be co-hosted and will be played at four stadiums in Poland — Warsaw, Gdansk, Wroclaw and Poznan, and four in Ukraine — Kiev, Donetsk, Kharkiv and Lviv.

Euro 2012 will be the last tournament to be staged with 16 teams. The tournament expands to 24 nations at its next edition in 2016 in France.

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