2017 UEFA European Under-21 Championship
| Mistrzostwa Europy U-21 w Piłce Nożnej 2017 | |
|---|---|
| Tournament details | |
| Host country | Poland |
| Dates | 16–30 June 2017 |
| Teams | 12 (from 1 confederation) |
| Venue(s) | 6 (in 6 host cities) |
The 2017 UEFA European Under-21 Championship (also known as UEFA Under-21 Euro 2017) will be the 21st edition of the UEFA European Under-21 Championship (24th edition if the Under-23 era is also included), the biennial international youth football championship organised by UEFA for the men's under-21 national teams of Europe. The final tournament will be hosted in Poland in mid-2017, after their bid was selected by the UEFA Executive Committee on 26 January 2015 in Nyon, Switzerland. The tournament will take place from 16 to 30 June 2017. Players born on or after 1 January 1994 will be eligible for the tournament.
In March 2012, UEFA announced that the competition would take place in even numbered years from 2016 onwards. In September 2013, UEFA announced its intention to continue holding the final tournament in odd numbered years following a request from its member national football associations. On 24 January 2014, UEFA confirmed that the final tournament will be held in 2017 and that it will be expanded from 8 teams to 12.
The hosts were announced at a meeting of the UEFA Executive Committee in Nyon on 26 January 2015. In late April 2014 the Polish football association PZPN very strongly indicated the country has high chances to host the tournament. Bidding to welcome Europe's best youth teams was one of the reasons for Poland's withdrawal from the Euro 2020 race.
A total of 53 UEFA nations entered the competition (Gibraltar did not enter), and with the hosts Poland qualifying automatically, the other 52 teams will compete in the qualifying competition to determine the remaining 11 spots in the final tournament. The qualifying competition, which will take place from March 2015 to November 2016, consists of two rounds:
The following teams qualified for the final tournament.
Note: All appearance statistics include only U-21 era (since 1978).
The final draw was held on 1 December 2016, 18:00 CET (UTC+1), at the ICE Congress Centre in Kraków. The 12 teams were drawn into three groups of four teams. The teams were seeded according to their coefficient ranking following the end of the qualifying play-offs, with the hosts Poland assigned to position A1 in the draw. Each group contained either the hosts or one team from Pot 1, one team from Pot 2, and two teams from Pot 3.
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