Courtesy: uefa.com

FIFA Futsal World Cup draw details

Two-time FIFA Futsal World Cup winners Spain are among 45 teams awaiting the European preliminary and main round draw for the 2016 edition, to be streamed live on UEFA.com at 14.30CET on Thursday 2 July. Europe has been allocated seven berths in the expanded 24-team finals in Colombia from 14 September to 2 October 2016.

Preliminary round
The 22 top-ranked sides will be excused the preliminary round but the others enter the first of the two draws in Nyon. The 23 teams – including World Cup debutants Denmark, Gibraltar, Sweden and Wales – have been split into four seeding pots by coefficient. Five groups will contain one team from all four categories and one more will contain three nations, from each of the top three categories. The six group winners will progress to the main round.

Three nations have been assigned as mini-tournament hosts and will be drawn separately and placed in each group according to their seeding. Three sections will therefore be drawn without a host allocated. These groups will need to decide who is hosting the qualifying tournament and, should no agreement be found, UEFA will proceed to a draw in due course to determine the organisers of these pools.

Main round
The contenders have been split into four seeding categories, with the top section including European champions Italy and Spain, who will attempt to repeat their 2000 and 2004 World Cup wins, having lost the 2008 and 2012 finals to Brazil. The draw procedure will be similar to that for the preliminary round.

The top two teams in each of the seven main round groups will progress to the play-offs (group winners drawn against runners-up), which will decide Europe's qualifiers for Colombia.

Preliminary round draw
Pot 1 – seeding position 4
Gibraltar
Estonia
Wales
Malta
San Marino

Pot 2 – seeding position 3
Andorra
Albania
Sweden
Cyprus*
Denmark
Switzerland

Pot 3 – seeding position 2
Moldova
England
Montenegro
Lithuania*
Bulgaria
Armenia

Pot 4 – seeding position 1
Latvia
France
Finland
Georgia
Greece
Israel*

*Host

Main round draw
Pot 5 – hosts
Italy (seeding position 1)
Portugal (1)
Croatia (1)
Czech Republic (1)
Hungary (2)
Netherlands (2)
Turkey (3)

Pot 6 – seeding position 4
Norway
Winners preliminary round Groups A-F

Pot 7 – seeding position 3
Belarus
Belgium
Bosnia and Herzegovina
Kazakhstan
Poland
FYR Macedonia

Pot 8 – seeding position 2
Serbia
Romania
Slovenia
Azerbaijan
Slovakia

Pot 9 – seeding position 1
Spain
Russia
Ukraine

Road to Colombia
2 July 2015: preliminary & main round draws, Nyon
(15 & 22 September 2015: UEFA Futsal EURO 2016 play-offs)
22, 23, & 25 October 2015: preliminary round
10, 11 & 13 December 2015: main round
(2-13 February 2016: UEFA Futsal EURO 2016, Belgrade)
12 February 2016: play-off draw, Belgrade
22 March & 12 April 2016: play-offs
tbc: final tournament draw, Colombia
14 September–2 October 2016: final tournament, Colombia






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