The European Championship trophy will be awarded to the winning team of UEFA Euro 2024 at the Olympiastadion in Berlin on 14 July, but just what is the story behind the eye-catching piece of silverware? bundesliga.com investigates...

The official name of the trophy every captain will want to get their hands on after this summer's footballing jamboree in Germany is the Henri Delaunay Cup. Named after the French football administrator whose dream it was to have a European continental competition pitting the finest footballing nations against one another, the cup had its first showing at the inaugural four-team tournament held in France in 1960, some five years after Delaunay's passing. 

The task of finding someone to create and produce the original trophy fell upon Delaunay's son Pierre - who succeeded his father as UEFA general secretary - and, in collaboration with the silversmith Chobillion, a visually impressive cup which stood at 43 centimetres tall was moulded.

Germany captain Franz Beckenbauer (r.) receives the Henri Delauney Cup in 1972. - via www.imago-images.de

That the trophy - reproduced ahead of the 2008 European Championships - bares a resemblance to an ancient Greek artefact is no accident. Pierre Delaunay's thinking was that Europe being a word of Greek origin and Greece being the inventors of the Olympic Games, the European Championship trophy should have a Hellenic feel.  

Originally called the Nations' Cup, the tournament grew over the years and would later be known as the UEFA European Football Championships, while nowadays the competition is almost universally referred to as the Euros. 

In order to represent that growth, and to make the trophy more similar in size to its other cups - UEFA decided to increase the size of the Henri Delaunay Cup, and so brought in silversmiths Asprey of London to get to work on the prize ahead of the 2008 finals in Austria and Switzerland.  

Philipp Lahm (l.) and Cacau (r.) presented the trophy on the first leg of its tour in Stuttgart on 22 March. - Christian Kaspar-Bartke - UEFA

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Based on the original, the newer version is now 60 centimetres and significantly heavier than the older trophy at eight kilograms.

The names of winning countries are now contained on the cup itself, as opposed to a plinth, while the base has also been made larger. Spanish goalkeeper Iker Casillas was the first captain to lift the revised edition of the famous prize, which kept its original name attributed to Henri Delaunay's grand vision.   

Fans can get a chance to see the famous cup close up when it will be on show in the 10 Euro 2024 host cities across Germany as part of a trophy tour which runs from 22 March until 14 May.

Tournament director Philipp Lahm and German FA vice-president Celia Šašić will be joined by mascot Albärt on the tour.

The trophy was in Cologne on 5-6 April. - Lars Baron - UEFA

Dates and locations for the Euro 2024 trophy tour

• 22-24 March: Stuttgart
• 2-3 April: Frankfurt
• 5-6 April: Cologne
• 9-10 April: Düsseldorf
• 13-14 April: Dortmund
• 16-17 April: Gelsenkirchen
• 24-25 April: Berlin
• 6- 7 May: Leipzig
• 10-11 May: Hamburg
• 13-14 May: Munich

Find out more about the stadiums and host cities for Euro 2024 here!