1996 UEFA European Under-21 Football Championship
The UEFA U-21 Championship 1996, which spanned two years (1994-96), had 44 entrants. After the quarter-finals stage, Spain were chosen as the hosts of the final stages, consisting of four matches in total.
No fewer than 13 newly-independent nations competed for the first time - due mainly to the fall of Socialist rule in Europe in the early 1990s.
Russia, who competed in 1994 were joined by nine further former Soviet Union states: Armenia, Azerbaijan, Belarus, Estonia, Georgia, Latvia, Lithuania, Moldova and Ukraine.
The exclusion (for political reasons) of the team from Serbia and Montenegro, then known as the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia continued. Croatia, Slovenia and the Republic of Macedonia were three former states of Yugoslavia who did compete though.
Czechoslovakia became two separate nations - teams from the Czech Republic and Slovakia complete the list of new entrants.
Italy U-21s won the competition for the third consecutive time.
The 44 national teams were divided into eight groups (four groups of 5 + four groups of 6). The group winners played off against each other on a two-legged home-and-away basis to determine the final four, one of whom would host the last four matches. The top five nations qualify for the Atlanta '96 Olympics.
Read more about 1996 UEFA European Under-21 Football Championship: Olympic Qualifiers
Famous quotes containing the words european and/or football:
“European society has always been divided into classes in a way that American society never has been. A European writer considers himself to be part of an old and honorable tradition—of intellectual activity, of letters—and his choice of a vocation does not cause him any uneasy wonder as to whether or not it will cost him all his friends. But this tradition does not exist in America.”
—James Baldwin (1924–1987)
“Idon’t enjoy getting knocked about on a football field for other people’s amusement. I enjoy it if I’m being paid a lot for it.”
—David Storey (b. 1933)