2026 UEFA European Under-19 Championship

2026 UEFA European Under-19 Championship
Pencampwriaeth Ewropeaidd Dan-19 UEFA 2026
Tournament details
Host country	Wales
Cities	Wrexham Bangor Caernarfon Denbigh
Dates	28 June – 11 July
Teams	8 (from 1 confederation)
Venues	4 (in 4 host cities)
Tournament statistics
Matches played	4
Goals scored	19 (4.75 per match)
Top scorer(s)	Otto Stange José Morante (2 goals each)
← 2025 2027 →

The 2026 UEFA European Under-19 Championship is the 23rd edition of the UEFA European Under-19 Championship and the 73rd edition if the Under-18 and Junior eras are also included. It is the annual international youth football championship organised by UEFA for the men's under-19 national teams of Europe. Wales, which was selected by UEFA on 26 September 2023, is hosting the tournament from 28 June to 11 July 2026.^[1]^[2]^[3] A total of eight teams are playing in the tournament, with players born on or after 1 January 2007 eligible to participate.

As with previous editions held in even-numbered years, the tournament will act as the UEFA qualification tournament for the FIFA U-20 World Cup. The four semi-finalists will qualify for the 2027 FIFA U-20 World Cup in Azerbaijan and Uzbekistan, while the two third-placed teams in the group stage will meet in a play-off for another UEFA berth.^[4]^[5]

Venues

Upon being awarded the tournament in 2023, the Football Association of Wales anticipated that the tournament would be staged across five venues in north Wales: Bangor, Colwyn Bay, Deeside, Denbigh and Wrexham.^[3] The final list of match venues was later confirmed as four stadiums: the Racecourse Ground in Wrexham, Bangor City Stadium in Bangor, The Oval in Caernarfon and Central Park in Denbigh.^[6]^[7] Colwyn Bay and Rhyl were listed among the training venues for the tournament.^[6]

Wrexham	Bangor
Racecourse Ground	Bangor City Stadium
Capacity: 13,341	Capacity: 3,000

Wrexham Bangor Denbigh Caernarfon
Caernarfon	Denbigh
The Oval Capacity: 3,000	Central Park Capacity: 2,300

Qualification

Qualified teams

The following teams qualified for the final tournament.

Note: All appearance statistics include only the U-19 era since 2002.

Team	Qualification method	Date of qualification	Appearance(s)				Previous best performance^[a]
Team	Qualification method	Date of qualification	Total	First	Last	Streak	Previous best performance^[a]
Wales	Host nation	26 September 2023	1st	Debut			Debut
Germany	Elite round Group 1 winners	31 March 2026	11th	2002	2025	2	Champions (2008, 2014)
Serbia	Elite round Group 2 winners	31 March 2026	9th	2005	2022	1	Champions (2013)
Croatia	Elite round Group 3 winners	31 March 2026	4th	2010	2016	1	Semi-finals (2010)
Denmark	Elite round Group 4 winners	31 March 2026	3rd	2024	2025	3	Group stage (2024, 2025)
Ukraine	Elite round Group 5 winners	28 March 2026	7th	2004	2024	1	Champions (2009)
Italy	Elite round Group 6 winners	31 March 2026	11th	2003	2024	1	Champions (2003, 2023)
Spain	Elite round Group 7 winners	31 March 2026	16th	2002	2025	4	Champions (2002, 2004, 2006, 2007, 2011, 2012, 2015, 2019, 2024)

Officials

A total of 6 Referees, 8 Assistants and 2 Fourth Officials were selected for the tournament.

Referees	Assistant Referees	Fourth Officials
Samuel Barrott (England) Florian Badstübner (Germany) Bence Csonka (Hungary) Igor Stojčevski (North Macedonia) Joey Kooij (Netherlands) Joakim Sars (Sweden)	Elşad Abdullayev (Azerbaijan) Wade Smith (England) Christian Gittelmann (Germany) Balázs Szert (Germany) Aleksandar Ǵurkovski (North Macedonia) Murat Küçükerbir (Netherlands) Adam Jeffrey (Northern Ireland) Simon Kristensson (Sweden)	Marius Hansen Grøtta (Norway) Aaron Wyn Jones (Wales)

Group stage

The group winners and runners-up advance to the semi-finals. The third-placed teams advance to the FIFA U-20 World Cup play-off.

Tie-breaking criteria for group play
The ranking of teams in the group stage is determined as follows: Points obtained in all group matches; Points in head-to-head matches among tied teams; Goal difference in head-to-head matches among tied teams; Goals scored in head-to-head matches among tied teams; If more than two teams are tied, and after applying all head-to-head criteria above, a subset of teams are still tied, all head-to-head criteria above are reapplied exclusively to this subset of teams; Goal difference in all group matches; Goals scored in all group matches; Penalty shoot-out if only two teams have the same number of points, and they met in the last round of the group and are tied after applying all criteria above (not used if more than two teams have the same number of points, or if their rankings are not relevant for qualification for the next stage); Disciplinary points Yellow card: −1 point; Indirect red card (second yellow card): −3 points; Direct red card: −3 points; UEFA coefficient for the qualifying round draw; Drawing of lots.

Group A

Pos	Team	Pld	W	L	GF	GA	GD	Pts	Qualification
1	Spain	1	1	0	7	0	+7	3	Knockout stage
2	Germany	1	1	0	4	3	+1	3	Knockout stage
3	Denmark	1	0	1	3	4	−1	0	FIFA U-20 World Cup play-off
4	Wales (H)	1	0	1	0	7	−7	0

Updated to match(es) played on 28 June 2026. Source: UEFA
Rules for classification: Group stage tiebreakers
(H) Hosts

28 June 2026 (2026-06-28)

18:00 BST

Wales	0−7	Spain
	Report	Yáñez 16' Espart 24' Morante 25', 34' Junyent 46' Esteban 77' Aguado 82'

Racecourse Ground, Wrexham

Referee: Joakim Östling (Sweden)

28 June 2026 (2026-06-28)

20:00 BST

Germany	4−3	Denmark
Onyeka 5' (pen.) Schjøtt 15' (o.g.) Stange 32', 61' (pen.)	Report	Hyseni 39' (pen.) Martin 51' Gøthler 72'

Central Park, Denbigh

Referee: Sam Barrott (England)

1 July 2026 (2026-07-01)

18:00 BST

Denmark	v	Spain
	Report

Central Park, Denbigh

1 July 2026 (2026-07-01)

20:00 BST

Wales	v	Germany
	Report

Racecourse Ground, Wrexham

4 July 2026 (2026-07-04)

14:00 BST

Denmark	v	Wales
	Report

Racecourse Ground, Wrexham

4 July 2026 (2026-07-04)

14:00 BST

Spain	v	Germany
	Report

Central Park, Denbigh

Group B

Pos	Team	Pld	W	L	GF	GA	GD	Pts	Qualification
1	Ukraine	1	1	0	3	1	+2	3	Knockout stage
2	Italy	1	1	0	2	0	+2	3	Knockout stage
3	Croatia	1	0	1	1	3	−2	0	FIFA U-20 World Cup play-off
4	Serbia	1	0	1	0	2	−2	0

Updated to match(es) played on 29 June 2026. Source: UEFA
Rules for classification: Group stage tiebreakers

29 June 2026 (2026-06-29)

16:00 BST

Italy	2–0	Serbia
Liberali 11' (pen.) Iddrissou 76'	Report

The Oval, Caernarfon

Referee: Florian Badstübner (Germany)

29 June 2026 (2026-06-29)

20:00 BST

Croatia	1−3	Ukraine
Barić 22' (pen.)	Report	Bohdanov 26' Kalyuzhnyi 48' Lyusin 57'

Bangor City Stadium, Bangor

Referee: Igor Stojchevski (North Macedonia)

2 July 2026 (2026-07-02)

14:00 BST

Croatia	v	Italy
	Report

The Oval, Caernarfon

2 July 2026 (2026-07-02)

18:00 BST

Serbia	v	Ukraine
	Report

Bangor City Stadium, Bangor

5 July 2026 (2026-07-05)

16:00 BST

Ukraine	v	Italy
	Report

Bangor City Stadium, Bangor

5 July 2026 (2026-07-05)

16:00 BST

Serbia	v	Croatia
	Report

The Oval, Caernarfon

Knockout stage

In the knockout stage, extra time and penalty shoot-out will be used to decide the winners if necessary.

Bracket

	Semi-finals				Final

	8 July – Central Park, Denbigh


					11 July – Racecourse Ground, Wrexham


	8 July – Racecourse Ground, Wrexham

FIFA U-20 World Cup play-off

Winners advance to the inter-confederation play-offs, to qualify for the 2027 FIFA U-20 World Cup.

8 July 2026 (2026-07-08)

14:00 BST

Third place Group A	v	Third place Group B

Bangor City Stadium, Bangor

Semi-finals

8 July 2026 (2026-07-08)

16:30 BST

Winner Group A	v	Runner-up Group B

Central Park, Denbigh

8 July 2026 (2026-07-08)

19:00 BST

Winner Group B	v	Runner-up Group A

Racecourse Ground, Wrexham

Final

11 July 2026 (2026-07-11)

19:00 BST

Winner semi-final 1	v	Winner semi-final 2

Racecourse Ground, Wrexham

Qualified teams for FIFA U-20 World Cup

The following teams from UEFA qualified for the 2027 FIFA U-20 World Cup, including Azerbaijan, which qualified as co-host. One further team will advance to the inter-confederation play-offs.

Team	Qualified on	Previous appearances in FIFA U-20 World Cup¹
Azerbaijan (H)	2 October 2025	0 (debut)
Winner Group A	5 July 2026
Winner Group B	5 July 2026
Runner-up Group A	5 July 2026
Runner-up Group B	5 July 2026
Playoff winner	8 July 2026

¹ Bold indicates champions for that year. Italic indicates hosts for that year.

Goalscorers

There were 19 goals scored in 4 matches, for an average of 4.75 goals per match.

2 goals

1 goal

1 own goal

Gustav Schjøtt (against Germany)

Source: UEFA

Notes

Bold text indicates they hosted that edition.

References

"Wales and Israel to stage U19 EURO in 2026 and 2027". UEFA. Union of European Football Associations. 26 September 2023. Retrieved 15 May 2026.
"2026 U19 EURO finals in Wales: Tournament information". UEFA. Union of European Football Associations. 17 April 2026. Retrieved 15 May 2026.
"Wales to host UEFA U19 Euro Championship 2026". faw.cymru. Football Association of Wales. 26 September 2023. Retrieved 15 May 2026.
"Under-19 EURO final tournament starts 28 June: Fixtures". UEFA. Union of European Football Associations. 16 April 2026. Retrieved 15 May 2026.
"2026 U19 EURO finals draw". UEFA. Union of European Football Associations. 16 April 2026. Retrieved 15 May 2026.
"UEFA Under-19 Championship Wales 2026: The Future of Football comes to North Wales". faw.cymru. Football Association of Wales. 3 April 2026. Retrieved 15 May 2026.
"UEFA U19 EURO". faw.cymru. Football Association of Wales. Retrieved 15 May 2026.

External links

Official website
UEFA U19 EURO 2026 at the Football Association of Wales