24 teams, six groups: how the EHF EURO 2020 Draw will be done
The Men’s EHF EURO 2020 Qualifiers experienced a dramatic finish on Sunday night as Round 6 confirmed the last of the 24 teams taking part in the final tournament from 9 to 26 January.
Apart from co-hosts Austria, Norway and Sweden as well as defending champions Spain, 20 other nations successfully navigated their way through the qualifiers to earn a berth for the first ever EHF EURO with 24 teams on the starting grid.
The preliminary round of the final tournament will be held in Graz, Vienna, Trondheim, Malmö and Gothenburg; the main-round venues are Vienna and Malmö; and the final weekend is taking place in Stockholm.
The preliminary round will consist of six groups of four teams each. The draw for this group phase will be conducted on Friday 28 June at 18:45 hrs at Erste Bank Campus in Vienna. The draw will be streamed live on the EHF EURO Youtube channel and the EHF EURO Facebook page.
Based on the qualification groups and the ranking of the EHF EURO 2018, the 24 teams are seeded as follows:
POT 1: Spain, Sweden, France, Denmark, Croatia, Czech Republic
(defending champions, organiser SWE, 4 first ranked teams of qualifiers)
POT 2: Norway, Slovenia, Germany, North Macedonia, Hungary, Belarus
(organiser NOR, 4 remaining first ranked teams of qualifiers, 1 second ranked team of qualifiers)
POT 3: Austria, Iceland, Montenegro, Portugal, Switzerland, Latvia
(organiser AUT, 5 second-ranked teams of qualifiers)
POT 4: Poland, Russia, Serbia, Ukraine, Bosnia-Hercegovina, Netherlands
(2 second-ranked teams of qualifiers, 4 best third-ranked teams of qualifiers)
Overview of preliminary round groups
The organisers had the right to place one team each ahead of the draw. Croatia was therefore placed in Group A in Graz, Germany will play in Group C in Trondheim, and Denmark will play their first matches in Malmö.
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Group A |
Group B |
Group C |
Group D |
Group E |
Group F |
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Graz |
Vienna |
Trondheim |
Trondheim |
Malmö |
Gothenburg |
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Row 1 |
Croatia |
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Denmark |
Sweden |
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Row 2 |
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Germany |
Norway |
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Row 3 |
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Austria |
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Row 4 |
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The draw procedure will follow these steps:
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3 teams from pot 1 are drawn into row 1
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4 teams from pot 2 are drawn into row 2
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5 teams from pot 3 are drawn into row 3
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6 teams from pot 4 are drawn into row 4
In the new 24-team format of the the Men’s EHF EURO there will be 65 matches played over 18 days. The top-two ranked teams from each group qualify for the two main round groups, which will consist of six teams each.
Ultimately, the semi-finals and finals will be played in Stockholm over a three-day final weekend.
The draw procedure is also available for download.
TEXT:
EHF / ew