Record number of registrations for Men’s 18 EHF tournaments in 2016

It is a new era for the EHF’s younger age category tournaments, and it very much looks like as if the member federations are accepting the change.

42 European federations have registered their Men’s 18 teams for the championships next year – never before in the history of the EHF there have been that many expressing their interest.

Starting 2016 with the men’s under-18 category the system is set for an overhaul with the aim of optimising the competition level, providing all teams with a reasonable number of matches and reducing the costs for organisation and participation in order to keep the competitions accessible.

There are no qualifications being played, instead a system of one ‘Division 1’ tournament and several ‘Division 2’ tournaments (depending on the number of registrations) will take place.

A promotion system will come into effect between the Division 1 and the Division 2 tournaments.

This was a motion by the EHF that was approved by the EHF Congress back in September last year.

Following the end of the registration phase for the Men’s 18 EHF EURO 2016, the Division 1 event, and the Men’s 18 EHF Championships 2016, the Division 2 events, these teams will participate:

Croatia, Czech Republic, Denmark, Spain, France, Germany, Iceland, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Russia, Slovenia, Serbia, Switzerland, Slovakia and Sweden at the Men’s 18 EHF EURO 2016.

Armenia, Austria, Belgium, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Belarus, Bulgaria, Estonia, Faroe Islands, Finland, Great Britain, Georgia, Greece, Hungary, Israel, Italy, Kosovo, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Moldova, FYR Macedonia, Montenegro, Netherlands, Romania, Turkey and Ukraine at the Men’s 18 EHF Championships 2016.

It is planned that three separate – one with 10 teams, two with eight teams each – EHF Championships will take place.

The registered nations will be drawn to the different EHF Championships according to a ranking list and with the aim of achieving a homogenous level of performance across all three events.

Next year’s Men’s 18 EHF EURO is scheduled to take place from 11 to 21 August 2016, the championship events are planned to take place within the same time frame.

The call for organisers for all events concerned is still ongoing with the deadline being at 31 March. Only federations being ranked in ‘Division 1’ can host the ‘Division 1’ final tournament (this holds true vice versa for ‘Division 2’).

The final tournaments will be awarded by the EHF Executive Committee in June 2015.