Euro 2012 – Poland & Ukraine

The fourteenth edition of the European Championships will be held at eight venues across Poland and Ukraine. The format remains unchanged for the fifth successive finals tournament and it is the third time UEFA have used joint hosts. The eight host cities are Warsaw, Gdansk, Wroclaw and Poznan in Poland and Kyiv, Donetsk, Lviv and Dnipropetrovsk in the Ukraine. The opening game will be in Warsaw and the final in Kyiv.

The draw for the qualifying tournament took place in Warsaw on the 7th February 2010. Poland and Ukraine qualiy automatically as joint hosts. The other 51 UEFA member nations were drawn in to nine groups (6 with 6 teams and 3 with 5 teams) to play each other twice on a home and away basis. The nine group winners and the group runner up with the best record will qualify directly for the finals. The other eight runners up will face two-legged play offs for the remaining four finals places. For the first time ever, the draw was fixed to ensure that certain teams wouldn’t meet each other for political reasons. Thus Azerbaijan were kept apart from Armenia and Russia were unable to face Georgia due to tensions between those countries. The seedings for the qualifying draw were as follows:

Pot 1: Spain, Germany, Netherlands, Italy, England, Croatia, Portugal, France, Russia

Pot 2: Greece, Czech Republic, Sweden, Switzerland, Serbia, Turkey, Denmark, Slovakia, Romania

Pot 3: Israel, Bulgaria, Finland, Norway, Republic of Ireland, Scotland, Northern Ireland, Austria, Bosnia

Pot 4: Slovenia, Latvia, Hungary, Lithuania, Belarus, Belgium, Wales, Macedonia, Cyprus

Pot 5: Montenegro, Albania, Estonia, Georgia, Moldova, Iceland, Armenia, Kazakhstan, Liechtenstein

Pot 6: Azerbaijan, Luxembourg, Malta, Faroe Islands, Andorra, San Marino

The Qualifying Groups

Group A
Germany
Turkey
Austria
Belgium
Kazakhstan
Azerbaijan

Group B
Russia
Slovakia
Republic of Ireland
FYR Macedonia
Armenia
Andorra

Group C
Italy
Serbia
Northern Ireland
Slovenia
Estonia
Faroe Islands

Group D
France
Romania
Bosnia-Hercegovina
Belarus
Albania
Luxembourg

Group E
Holland
Sweden
Finland
Hungary
Moldova
San Marino

Group F
Croatia
Greece
Israel
Latvia
Georgia
Malta

Group G
England
Switzerland
Bulgaria
Wales
Montenegro

Group H
Portugal
Denmark
Norway
Cyprus
Iceland

Group I
Spain
Czech Republic
Scotland
Lithuania
Liechtenstein

The teams in each group have until Tuesday the 16th March 2010 to agree on the group fixtures amongst themselves. If they haven’t reached a consensus by that date then UEFA will decide the dates for them. Qualifying matches will take place on the following dates:

3rd & 4th & 7th of September 2010
8th & 9th & 12th of October 2010
25th & 26th & 29th of March 2011
3rd & 4th & 7th of June 2011
2nd & 3rd & 6th of September 2011
7th & 8th & 11th of October 2011

Play-offs between the eight worst runners-up:
First legs: 11th & 12th of November 2011
Second legs: 15th of November 2011

Further information and previews will be added to our Euro 2012 guide as the event approaches.