2022 UEFA European Under-19 Championship

2022 UEFA European Under-19 Championship
Majstrovstvá Európy vo futbale hráčov do 19 rokov 2022
Tournament details
Host country	Slovakia
Dates	18 June – 1 July
Teams	8 (from 1 confederation)
Venue(s)	5 (in 5 host cities)
Final positions
Champions	England (11th title)
Runners-up	Israel
Tournament statistics
Matches played	16
Goals scored	51 (3.19 per match)
Attendance	38,555 (2,410 per match)
Top scorer(s)	Loum Tchaouna; (4 goals)
	← 2019; 2020; 2021 2023 →

The 2022 UEFA European Under-19 Championship (also known as UEFA Under-19 Euro 2022) was the 19th edition of the UEFA European Under-19 Championship (69th edition if the Under-18 and Junior eras are included), the annual international youth football championship organised by UEFA for the men's under-19 national teams of Europe. Slovakia hosted the tournament between 18 June and 1 July 2022.^[1] A total of eight teams played in the tournament, with players born on or after 1 January 2003 eligible to participate.

Same as previous editions held in even-numbered years, the tournament acted as the UEFA qualifiers for the FIFA U-20 World Cup. The top five teams of the tournament qualified for the 2023 FIFA U-20 World Cup in Argentina as the UEFA representatives.

Spain were the defending champions, having won the last tournament held in 2019, with the 2020 and 2021 editions cancelled due to the COVID-19 pandemic in Europe and the title was not awarded. They were not able to defend the title after failing to qualify for the competition.

Host selection[edit]

The timeline of host selection was as follows:^[2]

11 January 2019: bidding procedure launched
28 February 2019: deadline to express interest
27 March 2019: Announcement by UEFA that declaration of interest were received from 17 member associations to host one of the UEFA national team youth final tournaments (UEFA European Under-19 Championship, UEFA Women's Under-19 Championship, UEFA European Under-17 Championship, UEFA Women's Under-17 Championship) in 2021 and 2022 (although it was not specified which association were interested in which tournament)
28 June 2019: Submission of bid dossiers
24 September 2019: Selection of successful host associations by the UEFA Executive Committee at its meeting in Ljubljana

For the UEFA European Under-19 Championship final tournaments of 2021 and 2022, Romania and Slovakia were selected as hosts respectively.^[1]

Qualification[edit]

The UEFA Executive Committee originally decided on 29 May 2019 to test a new qualifying format for the Under-19 Championship in 2022 and 2023.^[3] The qualifying competition would have been played in four rounds over a two-year period from autumn 2020 to spring 2022, with teams divided into three leagues, and promotion and relegation between leagues after each round similar to the UEFA Nations League.^[4] However, on 17 June 2020, UEFA announced that the introduction of the new format had been postponed to the 2023 edition due to the COVID-19 pandemic in Europe, and qualification for the 2022 edition would use the previous format involving two rounds only.^[5]^[6]

A total of 54 (out of 55) UEFA nations entered the competition, and with the hosts Slovakia qualifying automatically, the other 53 teams will compete in the qualifying competition, which consisted of two rounds: the Qualifying round, which took place in autumn 2021, and the Elite round, which took place in spring 2022, to determine the remaining seven spots in the final tournament. The draw for the qualifying round was held on 9 December 2020, 10:30 CET (UTC+1), at the UEFA headquarters in Nyon, Switzerland.^[7]^[8]

Qualified teams[edit]

The following teams qualified for the final tournament.

Note: All appearance statistics include only U-19 era (since 2002).

Team	Method of qualification	Appearance	Last appearance	Previous best performance
Slovakia	Hosts	2nd	2002	Third place (2002)
Israel	Elite round Group 1 winners	2nd	2014	Group stage (2014)
France	Elite round Group 2 winners	12th	2019	Champions (2005, 2010, 2016)
England	Elite round Group 3 winners	11th	2018	Champions (2017)
Romania	Elite round Group 4 winners	2nd	2011	Group stage (2011)
Italy	Elite round Group 5 winners	8th	2019	Champions (2003)
Serbia	Elite round Group 6 winners	8th	2014	Champions (2013)
Austria	Elite round Group 7 winners	8th	2016	Semi-finals (2003, 2006, 2014)

Venues[edit]

Trnava	Dunajská Streda	Banská Bystrica
City Aréna - Štadión Antona Malatinského	DAC Aréna	Štiavničky - Štadión SNP
Capacity: 19,200	Capacity: 12,700	Capacity: 7,900

Žiar nad Hronom	Trnava Senec Banská Bystrica Žiar nad Hronom Dunajská Streda
Mestský štadión Žiar nad Hronom
Capacity: 2,309

Senec
NTC Senec
Capacity: 3,264

Match officials[edit]

The following officials were appointed for the final tournament:

Referees

Assistant referees

Mathias Hillaert
Deniz Sokolov
Steffen Beck Bramsen
Turkka Joonas Valjakka
Davit Gabisonia
Edgaras Bučinskas
Luke Portelli
Pedro Martins

Fourth officials

Squads[edit]

Group stage[edit]

The final tournament schedule was announced on 28 April 2022.^[9]

The group winners and runners-up advanced to the semi-finals and qualify for the 2023 FIFA U-20 World Cup.

Group A[edit]

Pos	Team	Pld	W	L	GF	GA	GD	Pts	Qualification
1	France	3	3	0	11	2	+9	9	Knockout stage and 2023 FIFA U-20 World Cup
2	Italy	3	2	1	4	5	−1	6	Knockout stage and 2023 FIFA U-20 World Cup
3	Slovakia (H)	3	1	2	1	6	−5	3	FIFA U-20 World Cup play-off
4	Romania	3	0	3	2	5	−3	0

Source: UEFA
(H) Hosts

18 June 2022

17:30

Slovakia	0–5	France
	Report	Tchaouna 16' Bonny 34', 59' Virginius 57', 62'

Anton Malatinský Stadium, Trnava

Attendance: 5,238

Referee: Morten Krogh (Denmark)

18 June 2022