Sweden to stage 2009 U-21 European Championship

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:nw: :tup: :nw: :tup: :nw: :tup: :nw: :tup: :nw:

SWEDEN WILL HOST THE U-21 EUROPEAN CHAMPIONSHIP!!!!!!!!!!

Stockholm to stage 2009 draw

Thursday, 8 February 2007

The eight teams who will contest this summer's UEFA European Under-21 Championship are among 51 member associations awaiting Tuesday's draw for the 2009 edition in Sweden.

Five pots

The Hilton Stockholm Slussen Hotel will stage the event, with proceedings set to commence from 14.00CET. Sweden qualify automatically for the finals, leaving 51 other contenders to be allocated into the following five pots - based on their coefficients - for the draw:

A: Netherlands, Portugal, Italy, France, Germany, Belgium, Serbia, Czech Republic, Denmark.

B: Russia, England, Croatia, Israel, Switzerland, Hungary, Romania, Ukraine, Slovakia, Slovenia.

C: Turkey, Greece, Poland, Belarus, Norway, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Iceland, Bulgaria, Lithuania, Moldova.

D: Austria, Latvia, Wales, Republic of Ireland, Northern Ireland, F.Y.R. Macedonia, Georgia, Armenia, Albania, Finland.

E: Scotland, Kazakhstan, Cyprus, Malta, San Marino, Estonia, Azerbaijan, Luxembourg, Liechtenstein, Faroe Islands, Montenegro.

Montenegro first

The Netherlands are the only seeded team, having won the 2006 final in Porto, and are joined in the top pot by five of the sides who will attempt to dethrone them on home soil in June - Portugal, Italy, Belgium, Serbia and the Czech Republic. The remaining 2007 finalists, England and Israel, are in pot B. The draw will feature Montenegro for the first time, after the country was accepted as a member association at the UEFA congress in Dusseldorf at the end of January.

Play-offs

Having been drawn into nine groups of five and one of ten, the teams will do battle over ten matchdays (scheduled to take place between 2 June this year and 10 September 2008) in a bid to reach the play-offs. These will be contested by the ten group winners and four best runners-up from the qualifying competition, with the seven winners of the two-legged ties joining Sweden in the final tournament.

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Sweden's five cities fit for 2009

Thursday, 8 February 2007

An eclectic mix of the traditional and the new age can be found in the five venues that will host the 2009 UEFA European Under-21 Championship in Sweden.

Group A

The opening match of the finals tournament, as well as one of the semi-finals, will be played at a brand-new arena currently under construction next to Malmo FF's ground, the Malmo Stadion, which was used for the 1958 FIFA World Cup and EURO '92. The stadium will have a 28,000 capacity and will become the home of Malmo FF once building has been completed in April 2009. Group A's other games will be held at the Olympia Stadion, located 65km to the north of Malmo, and the seat of Allsvenskan outfit Helsingborgs IF. The 17,000-capacity Olympia has undergone several renovations in recent times, the latest in 2001.

Group B

A number of Group B fixtures and the other semi-final are scheduled to take place in Gothenburg's new stadium, which is presently under construction - the New Ullevi, or 'Old Ullevi' as it is now known, having been razed to the ground in December 2006 to eventually be replaced by a newer model in the summer of 2008. The town's three big clubs, IFK Goteborg, GAIS Goteborg and & Orgryte IS, will share this arena, which like the Olympia will house 17,000 spectators. Lying 65km to the east of Gothenburg, the city of Boras will host Group B's remaining ties. The Boras Arena is home to 2006 Swedish champions IF Elfsborg, accommodates just over 14,000 supporters, and is the newest stadium in use in the country. Although it has an artificial surface, grass will be laid in time for the 2009 finals.

The final

There could be no more appropriate location for the UEFA European U21 Championship than the Rasunda Stadion in Solna. The Stockholm-based venue has been the scene of numerous high-profile events including the 1958 World Cup final, the 1995 FIFA Women's World Cup showpiece, the 1998 UEFA Cup Winners' Cup final and the EURO '92 semi-final between Germany and Sweden. The Rasunda is Sweden's national stadium, has a capacity of 36,800, and will provide a memorable backdrop to the final in two and a half years' time.

Trivia : Helena Paparizou was born in Boras :D

[dark_horse]

Countdown to Sweden 2009

Monday 25 June 2007

As the Netherlands celebrated their second successive Under-21 title in Groningen on Saturday the countdown to the 2009 UEFA European Under-21 Championship began in earnest. The 2007 edition was a huge success both on and off the pitch, leaving hosts Sweden with a tough act to follow. It is a challenge Under-21 coach Jorgen Lennartsson is relishing.

Big event

"We have to let people in Sweden know how big this tournament is," he told uefa.com. "They need to know how high the standard of football is and what big stars are playing in it. There isn't much difference between this and a [senior UEFA] European Championship so we can learn a lot from it - from the organisation which has been a real success, but on the football side as well. As host nation it will be very important to handle the pressure from the media and the nation. The Dutch team have done that very well."

Attendance record

An average of 22,000 watched the Netherlands' five games here with well over 200,000 people attending matches. That is a record at this level but Lennartsson, who works in tandem with Tommy Soderberg with the Under-21s, believes there is still room for improvement. "Absolutely, you can see interest in the tournament is growing more and more. But of course it's important the big footballing nations with lots of supporters and good players qualify. It is also a very good decision by UEFA to change the year of the final [to odd years] so it's not at the same time as the senior tournaments. We have to work very hard now to make sure the tournament in Sweden is as successful as here."

New stadiums

Sweden 2009 will have four principle host cities, Gothenburg, Helsingborg, Malmo and Boras, before attention switches to the national 36,800-seat Rasunda Stadion in Solna for the final. Stadiums in Malmo and Gothenburg are being built specifically for the tournament. "All four cities have a big football history and lots of spectators interested in football," said Lennartsson who watched the Netherlands beat Serbia 4-1 in Saturday's final on uefa.com. "Everything will be absolutely ready."

'Good friends'

That goes for his team as well. Sweden were famously eliminated from this year's competition by Serbia 5-3 on aggregate after winning the first leg 3-0 in Novi Sad. There was no shame in losing to an excellent Serbian side, and Lennartsson has wisely been using the past fortnight watching games and visiting training camps to learn from some of the teams here. "Normally when you lose 5-0 you don't want to be with the team you lost against but [Miroslav] Djukić is a very good coach and a big gentleman and we have built a very good relationship. We also visited Foppe de Haan at the Dutch training camp to see how they coped with not having any qualification games and having to play friendlies. Both coaches and teams in the final are good friends to us in Sweden."

Qualifying

In all 51 UEFA member associations will compete for a place in Sweden and qualification has already begun. Lennartsson knows, though, that for the event to truly take off one team in particular must succeed. "It will be a big event in Sweden," he said. "We will get some experience from this tournament in Holland, learn from that and work very, very hard to get the team ready. We must have a team that can play at a high level. We have two years to produce that and we are very positive about it." A nation expects.

[dark_horse]

HEJA SVERIGE!!!!!!!!!