32 teams discover opponents in YAC beach handball draw

Tuesday morning's Under 16 Beach Handball European Championship draw included a total of 32 teams, 16 in both the men's and women's competition, which means a new playing format.

Both competitions will be played with preliminary round containing four groups of four teams each. The top two teams in each group will qualify for the knock-out phase, going through to the quarter-final matches.

The competition will continue for the bottom placed two teams in each group as they will progress to play cross matches and compete for places 9-16.

The new format was put into preactice with the draw, carried out with the help of Beach Handball Commission member Marco Trespidi and Mario Bernardes of the Federacao de Andebol de Portugal, and here are the results.

Men’s competition:

Women's competition:

The final tournament will be played on 8 to 10 July 2016 in Nazare, Portugal. The top four finishers from the event will qualify for the IHF U17 World Championship in 2017 to be played in a venue yet to be announced by the International Handball Federation.

From there, the top three European nations at the World Championship will then qualify to play in the Youth Olympic Games in Buenos Aires, Argentina as beach handball makes its debut in the competition programme.