Young players line up for Women’s 17 EHF Championship in Italy
2017 Women’s 17 EHF Championship medallists Turkey and Poland are among the 10 teams who will play for the title in Italy.
Turkey won bronze in the 2017 W17 Championships in Lithuania, while Poland were silver medallists in the corresponding tournament in North Macedonia.
In this year’s competition, Turkey throw off their first match against Kosovo on Sunday. Poland face hosts Italy on Saturday.
The Italian competition takes place alongside a parallel edition of the W17 championship in Georgia. A total of 10 teams will fight for the title in each location, split into two groups of five teams each.
There is a lot to play for: the winner of each tournament will qualify for the W17 EHF EURO 2021, the W19 EHF EURO 2021, and also the Women’s Under-18 World Championship 2020.
All to play for
Turkey have been drawn in Group A in Italy, alongside the Czech Republic, Iceland, Kosovo and Israel.
Hosts Italy will compete in Group B, facing Poland, North Macedonia, Belarus and Azerbaijan.
Belarus and Italy also competed in the 2017 edition of the W17 Championship in Lithuania, finishing fifth and seventh respectively.
Meanwhile North Macedonia were fourth, Iceland sixth and Kosovo eighth in the North Macedonian tournament in 2017.
However, as the current teams have little experience of each other none of them are underestimating their opponents going into the tournament.
The W17 Championship in Italy throws off on Saturday at 14:00hrs local time as the Czech Republic play Kosovo.
All the action can be watched live on ehfTV.com and followed on the official website, where the playing schedules can also be found. The tournament runs from Saturday 3 August until finals day on Sunday 11 August.
TEXT:
Joanne Harris/ehf