M20 2012 Qualification Groups

The Men’s 20 European Handball Championship in an event for players born 1992 or younger. It will be carried out in Turkey between 5 and 15 July 2012 with the playing venues being Ankara Arena and THF Handball Complex, both in the capitol Ankara.

Sixteen teams will battle for the title, and three nations already qualified: hosts Turkey, Croatia – winners of the 2010 M18 European Championship – and Spain – runners-up of the 2010 M18 European Championship.

The remaining thirteen teams will qualify for the final tournament through qualification that will be carried out between 6 and 8 April 2012.

The qualification was drawn on 18 November 2011 in the Eventpyramide Vösendorf, south of Vienna (AUT) on the occasion of the Conference for Secretaries General, at the 20th anniversary of the European Handball Federation.

The draw gave us eight groups – five groups of four teams and three groups of three teams. From the groups 1 to 5 the top two teams will qualify, in the groups 6 to 8 only the group winner will qualify.

Group 1

• Denmark
• Russia
• Belarus
• Belgium

Group 2

• Germany
• Czech Republic
• Netherlands
• Ukraine

Group 3

• France
• Slovenia
• Romania
• Hungary

Group 4

• Serbia
• Norway
• Israel
• Austria

Group 5

• Switzerland
• Sweden
• Latvia
• Montenegro

Group 6

• Portugal
• Slovakia
• Bulgaria

Group 7

• Iceland
• Estonia
• Bosnia and Herzegovina

Group 8

• Poland
• Finland
• FYR Macedonia

Organisation Rights

A separate draw determined the right to organise the qualification tournament to the teams in row 1. If the national federation does not take advantage of the right to organise the tournament in their home country, the right will be passed on to the teams in row 3, then row 2 and otherwise row 4.

Teams which were already awarded with the right to organise the 2010 Men’s 20 ECh qualification groups do not have the right to be the organiser of a 2012 Men’s 20 ECh qualification group.

This applies to the Czech Republic, Finland, Israel, Portugal, Romania, Russia, Slovenia, Serbia and the Ukraine.