The long journey to the 25th IHF Women’s World Championship in November and December 2019 in Japan has begun, as the home rights draw for the first stage of European qualification took place in Vienna this week. The European qualification is separated into two stages, with a round-robin group phase serving as stage one, before the double header play-off matches decide nine of the continent’s World Championship places.

 

For the first phase, 16 teams were drawn into groups of four, with the home rights for each group announced on Tuesday. Playing in Group 1, Slovakia, Kosovo, Ukraine and Israel had already come to an agreement that Slovakia would be the hosts. Therefore, the draw concerned only groups 2, 3 and 4.

 

The first rights for Group 2, consisting of Switzerland, Faroe Islands, Lithuania and Finland, went to Switzerland, while the second went to Faroe Islands. In Group 3, featuring Belarus, Italy, Portugal and Greece, the first rights went to Greece and the second to Portugal. Turkey, FYR Macedonia, Iceland and Azerbaijan will play from Group 4, where the first rights were awarded to FYR Macedonia, the second to Iceland and the third to Turkey.

 

Groups 1, 2 and 4 will play their qualification events between November 30 and December 2 this year, while Group 3 will play from November 23 to 25. The top-ranked team from each group, as well as the best second-ranked side overall, will qualify for the play-offs. There they will join 13 other teams in the battle for the nine places at Japan 2019, with the play-offs scheduled to take place in June.

 

Only two nations that will contest the 2019 World Championship are already known: hosts Japan and 2017 world champions France. Three more European places will be decided at the EHF EURO 2018 in France this November and December.

 

More information on the European qualification phase for Japan 2019 can be found on the official website of the EHF.