UEFA European Under-21 Championship

Winners Cup of the UEFA Under 21 Championship

The European Under-21 Football Championship is a football competition organised by the sport's European governing body, UEFA. It is held every two years. The competition has existed in its current form since 1978. It was preceded by the Under 23 Challenge Cup which ran from 1967 to 1970. A true Under 23 championship was then formed, starting in 1972.

The age limit was reduced to 21 for the 1978 championship and it has remained so since. To be eligible for the campaign ending in 2009, players need to be born in or after 1986. Many can be actually 23 years old by the time the finals tournament takes place, however, when the qualification process began (late 2007) all players would have been 21 or under.

Under-21 matches are typically played on the day before senior internationals and where possible, the same qualifying groups and fixtures were played out. This was not true for the shortened 2006-7 Championship.

This tournament has been considered a stepping stone toward the senior team. Players such as Klaas Jan Huntelaar, Luis Figo, Petr Čech, Euro 2008 winner Iker Casillas, 2006 World Cup winners Francesco Totti and Andrea Pirlo and Euro 2004 winner Georgios Karagounis began their international careers in the youth teams.

Germany are the reigning champions, defeating England in the final, 4–0. The finals of the next competition will be hosted by Denmark in 2011.

Competition structure

Up to and including the 1992 competition, all entrants were divided into eight qualification groups, the eight winners of which formed the quarter-finals lineup. The remaining fixtures were played out on a two-legged, home and away basis to determine the eventual winner.

For the 1994 competition, one of the semi-finalists, France, was chosen as a host for the (single-legged) semi-finals, 3rd place playoff and final. Similarly, Spain was chosen to host the last four matches in 1996.

For 1998, nine qualification groups were used, as participation had reached 46, nearly double the 24 entrants in 1976. The top seven group winners qualified automatically for the finals, whilst the eighth- and ninth-best qualifiers, Greece and England, played-off for the final spot. The remaining matches, from the quarter-finals onward, were held in Romania, one of the eight qualifiers.

The 2000 competition also had nine groups, but the 9 winners and 7 runners-up went into a two-legged playoff to decide the eight qualifiers. From those, Slovakia was chosen as host. For the first time, the familiar finals group stage was employed, with the two winners contesting a final, and two runners-up contesting the 3rd-place playoff. The structure in 2002 was identical, except for the introduction of a semi-finals round after the finals group stage. Switzerland hosted the 2002 finals.

In 2004, ten qualification groups were used, with the group winners and six best runners-up going into the playoff. Germany was host that year. For 2006, the top two teams of eight large qualification groups provided the 16 teams for the playoffs, held in November 2005. Portugal hosted the finals.

Then followed the switch to odd years. The change was made because the senior teams of many nations often chose to promote players from their under-21s team as their own qualification campaign intensified. Staggering the tournaments allowed players more time to develop in the under-21 team rather than get promoted too early and end up becoming reserves for the seniors.

The 2007 competition actually began before the 2006 finals, with a qualification round to eliminate eight of the lowest-ranked nations. For the first time, the host (Netherlands) was chosen ahead of the qualification section. As hosts, Netherlands qualified automatically. Coincidentally, the Dutch team had won the 2006 competition - the holders would normally have gone through the qualification stage. The other nations were all drawn into fourteen three-team groups. The 14 group winners were paired in double-leg play-off to decide the seven qualifiers alongside the hosts.

Winners

Under-23 Challenge Cup winners

This was competed for on a basis similar to a boxing title belt. The holders played a randomly chosen opponent for the championship. This format was soon dropped in favour of one more familiar to the sport of football.

Date	Winners	Runners-up	Venue
June 1967	Bulgaria	East Germany	Stara Zagora, Bulgaria
September 1967	Bulgaria	Finland	Burgas, Bulgaria
November 1967	Bulgaria	Czechoslovakia	Pleven, Bulgaria
April 1968	Bulgaria	Netherlands	Sofia, Bulgaria
October 1968	Yugoslavia	Bulgaria	Rousse, Bulgaria
June 1969	Yugoslavia	Spain	Novi Sad, Yugoslavia
November 1969	Yugoslavia	Sweden	Zrenjanin, Yugoslavia
March 1970	Yugoslavia	Greece	Athens, Greece

Under-23 champions

Held only three times before it was relabelled by UEFA.

Competition	Winners	Runners-up
1970-1972	Czechoslovakia	Soviet Union
1972-1974	Hungary	East Germany
1974-1976	Soviet Union	Hungary

Under-21 champions and runners-up

Year	Final			Host Nation
	Winner	Score	Runner-Up
1978	Yugoslavia	1–0 / 4–4 5–4 on aggregate	East Germany	Not Applicable
1980	Soviet Union	0–0 / 1–0 1–0 on aggregate	East Germany	Not Applicable
1982	England	3–1 / 2–3 5–4 on aggregate	West Germany	Not Applicable
1984	England	1–0 / 2–0 3–0 on aggregate	Spain	Not Applicable
1986	Spain	1–2 / 2–1 3–3 on aggregate, (3–0) ps	Italy	Not Applicable
1988	France	0–0 / 3–0 3–0 on aggregate	Greece	Not Applicable
1990	Soviet Union	4–2 / 3–1 7–3 on aggregate	Yugoslavia	Not Applicable
1992	Italy	2–0 / 0–1 2–1 on aggregate	Sweden	Not Applicable
1994	Italy	1–0 aet	Portugal	France
1996	Italy	1–1 (4–2) ps	Spain	Spain
1998	Spain	1–0	Greece	Romania
2000	Italy	2–1	Czech Republic	Slovakia
2002	Czech Republic	0–0 (3–1) ps	France	Switzerland
2004	Italy	3–0	Serbia and Montenegro	Germany
2006	Netherlands	3–0	Ukraine	Portugal
2007	Netherlands	4–1	Serbia	Netherlands
2009	Germany	4–0	England	Sweden
2011		Qualifying in progress		Denmark

Under-21 winners by country

• 5 - Italy
• 2 - England
• 2 - Soviet Union
• 2 - Spain
• 2 - Netherlands
• 1 - Yugoslavia
• 1 - France
• 1 - Czech Republic
• 1 - Germany

Under-21 Golden Player

• 1978 - Vahid Halilhodžić - Yugoslavia
• 1980 - Anatoliy Demyanenko - Soviet Union
• 1982 - Rudi Völler - Germany
• 1984 - Mark Hateley - England
• 1986 - Manuel Sanchís - Spain
• 1988 - Laurent Blanc - France
• 1990 - Davor Šuker - Yugoslavia
• 1992 - Renato Buso - Italy
• 1994 - Luís Figo - Portugal
• 1996 - Fabio Cannavaro - Italy
• 1998 - Francesc Arnau - Spain
• 2000 - Andrea Pirlo - Italy
• 2002 - Petr Čech - Czech Republic
• 2004 - Alberto Gilardino - Italy
• 2006 - Klaas Jan Huntelaar - Netherlands
• 2007 - Royston Drenthe - Netherlands
• 2009 - Marcus Berg - Sweden

See also

• UEFA
• UEFA European Football Championship
• UEFA European Under-19 Football Championship
• UEFA European Under-17 Football Championship

External links

• UEFA European U-21 Championship at uefa.com
• The Rec.Sport.Soccer Statistics Foundation Contains full record of U-21/U-23 Championships.