The UEFA Executive Committee today met in Helsinki and took decisions on a variety of matters including the development of Futsal.
The general principle to stage the UEFA Europa League final in the same week as the UEFA Champions League final for the whole 2018–21 cycle was approved. This move was made so the UEFA Europa League final is played – like the UEFA Champions League final – after the end of the domestic season. As a consequence, the 2018/19 UEFA Europa League final will be played on Wednesday 29 May 2019. The venues for the two finals will be different, like today.
Strategic decisions for the development of Futsal
The UEFA Executive Committee today met in Helsinki, ahead of the 41st Ordinary UEFA Congress and took decisions on a variety of matters.
As part of a series of strategic decisions for the development of Futsal, the UEFA Executive Committee decided that:
• The UEFA Futsal EURO will be played every four years with 16 teams (instead of every two years with 12 teams) starting in 2022. This will offer an improved competition structure (qualifying competition over two seasons) and avoid the recurrent calendar clash with the FIFA Futsal World Cup competition every four years. The UEFA Futsal EURO 2020-22 will begin during the season 2020-21 and no UEFA Futsal EURO will take place in 2020.
• A UEFA Women’s Futsal EURO will be played every two years with 4 teams, starting in 2019, given the still limited number of existing women’s national teams in Europe.
• A UEFA Under-19 Futsal EURO will be played every two years with 8 teams starting in 2019.
• The format of the UEFA Futsal Cup was amended – starting in 2017/18 – to allow the top three associations in the national team coefficient ranking to enter a second representative, in addition to the titleholder.
• The UEFA Futsal Cup will be renamed the UEFA Futsal Champions League as from season 2018/19.
Finally, the UEFA Executive Committee confirmed the dates of the final tournament of the UEFA European Under-21 Championship Italy 2019 as 16 to 30 June 2019.
The next meeting of the UEFA Executive Committee will take place on 1 June 2017 in Cardiff.