The UEFA Executive Committee, which includes Andriy Pavelko, president of the UAF, met today in Hvar (Croatia) and, among other things, ratified the qualification draw procedure for Euro 2024, which will take place on October 9th in Frankfurt am Main.

The procedure for the qualification draw can be summarized as follows:

— Germany, the host association of Euro 2024, automatically qualifies for the final tournament and therefore does not participate in the qualifying draw;

— all Russian teams are currently excluded according to the decision of the UEFA Executive Committee on February 28, 2022, which was additionally confirmed by the Court of Arbitration for Sport on July 15, 2022. Therefore, Russia is not included in the Euro 2024 qualifying draw;

— 53 national associations will participate in the qualification draw, which will distribute participants into ten groups (seven groups of five teams and three groups of six teams);

— the ten group winners and ten second-placed teams will advance to the final tournament. The holders of another three spots will be determined in a playoff, which will take place in March 2024;

— the 53 participating teams will be seeded according to their overall ranking in the UEFA Nations League 2022/2023 and divided into seven pots;

— the national teams of Ukraine and Belarus will be separated before the qualifying draw.

Youth European Championship-2022/2023 (U-19) in futsal

Poreč (Croatia) was designated as the venue for the final tournament of the Euro 2022/2023 Futsal Championship among under-19 boys.

"Football in Schools" Festival

Earlier that day, the executive committee visited a mass festival "Football in Schools," where over 80 girls and boys played on mini-pitches alongside football legends and the UEFA president.

The initiative "Football in Schools," launched in 2020, aims to have more than 2.8 million children and over 81 thousand schools participate by 2024. After two years of the program, nearly 2.4 million children from 44 thousand schools are already participating. No less impressive is that over 100 thousand school teachers have already undergone training to conduct football sessions, surpassing the initial goal of 63 thousand.

It should be noted that nearly 24 million euros were invested in developing and promoting through play in schools life skills such as fair play, respect, teamwork, and leadership.