2020 FIFA Futsal World Cup qualification (UEFA)


The European qualifying competition for the 2020 FIFA Futsal World Cup is a men's futsal competition that will determine the six UEFA teams joining the automatically qualified hosts Lithuania in the 2021 FIFA Futsal World Cup.
Apart from Lithuania, a record 48 of the remaining 54 UEFA nations entered the competition, including World Cup qualifying debutants Germany, Kosovo, Scotland, and Northern Ireland who entered their first international men's futsal competition.

Format

The qualifying competition consists of four rounds:
In the preliminary round, main round and elite round, each group is played as a round-robin mini-tournament at the pre-selected hosts.

Tiebreakers

In the preliminary round, main round and elite round, teams are ranked according to points, and if tied on points, the following tiebreaking criteria are applied, in the order given, to determine the rankings :
  1. Points in head-to-head matches among tied teams;
  2. Goal difference in head-to-head matches among tied teams;
  3. Goals scored in head-to-head matches among tied teams;
  4. 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;
  5. Goal difference in all group matches;
  6. Goals scored in all group matches;
  7. 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 ;
  8. Disciplinary points ;
  9. UEFA coefficient;
  10. Drawing of lots.
In the play-offs, the team that scores more goals on aggregate over the two legs qualifies for the final tournament. If the aggregate score is level, the away goals rule is applied, i.e., the team that scores more goals away from home over the two legs advances. If away goals are also equal, extra time is played. The away goals rule is again applied after extra time, i.e., if there are goals scored during extra time and the aggregate score is still level, the visiting team advances by virtue of more away goals scored. If no goals are scored during extra time, the tie is decided by penalty shoot-out.

Teams

The 48 teams were seeded according to the coefficient ranking, calculated based on the following:
The coefficient ranking was also used for seeding in the preliminary round and main round draws, where each team was assigned a seeding position according to their ranking for the respective draw. Eight teams were pre-selected as hosts for the preliminary round and eight teams were pre-selected as hosts for the main round.
The draws for the preliminary round and main round was held on 12 December 2018, 14:00 CET, at the UEFA headquarters in Nyon, Switzerland. The mechanism of the draws for each round was as follows:
Team
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;Notes

Schedule

The qualifying matches are played on dates that fall within the FIFA Futsal International Match Calendar.
RoundDrawDates
Preliminary round12 December 201829 January – [|3] February 2019
Main round12 December 201822–27 October 2019
Elite round[|7] November 201927 January – 5 February 2020
Play-offs7 November 20192–11 November 2020

In the preliminary round, main round and elite round, the schedule of each group is as follows, with one rest day between matchdays [|2] and 3 for four-team groups, and no rest days for three-team groups :
Note: For scheduling, the hosts are considered as Team [|1], while the visiting teams are considered as Team 2, Team 3, and Team [|4] according to their seeding positions.
MatchdayMatches Matches
Matchday 12 v 4, 1 v 31 v 3
Matchday 23 v 2, 1 v 43 v 2
Matchday 34 v 3, 2 v 12 v 1

Preliminary round

The winners and runners-up of each group advanced to the main round to join the 16 teams which receive byes. The preliminary round was scheduled to be played between 29 January and 3 February 2019.
Times are CET, as listed by UEFA.

Group A


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Group B


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Group C


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Group D


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Group E


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Group F


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Group G


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Group H


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Main round

The winners and runners-up of each group advanced to the elite round. The main round was scheduled to be played between 22 and 27 October 2019.
Times up to 26 October 2019 are CEST, thereafter times are CET, as listed by UEFA.

Group 1


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Group 2

Note: Ukraine were originally to host.

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Group 3


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Group 4


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Group [|5]


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Group [|6]


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Group 7


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Group [|8]


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Elite round

The draws for the elite round and play-offs were held on 7 November 2019, 14:15 CET, at the UEFA headquarters in Nyon, Switzerland. For the elite round, the 16 teams were drawn into four groups of four, containing one best-four ranked main round group winner according to the coefficient ranking, one other main round group winner, and two main round group runners-up. First, a draw was held to select the four hosts from the seven potential hosts, which were allocated to their respective group as per their seeding positions. Next, the remaining 12 teams were drawn from their respective pot which were allocated according to their seeding positions. Teams from the same main round group could be drawn in the same group. Based on the decisions taken by the UEFA Emergency Panel, Russia and Ukraine could not be drawn in the same group.
;Legend
  • : [|Coefficient ranking] for seeding
  • ': Elite round hosts selected by draw
  • ': Potential elite round hosts not selected by draw
GroupWinnersRunners-up
SeedSeeding position 1 Seeding position 3 or 4
SeedSeeding position 2 Seeding position 3 or 4
1 '
2 '
3
4
5
6 '
7 ' '
8 '

For the play-offs, the four elite round group runners-up, whose identity was not known at the time of the draw, were drawn into two ties without any seeding. As Russia and Ukraine could not play against each other, if such a tie occur in the play-offs after the completion of the elite round, the second teams drawn in the two ties would be swapped.
The winners of each group qualified for the 2021 FIFA Futsal World Cup, while the runners-up of each group advanced to the play-offs. The elite round was scheduled to be played between 27 January and 5 February 2020.
Times are CET, as listed by UEFA.

Group A


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Group B


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Group C


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Group D


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Play-offs

The winners of each tie qualify for the 2021 FIFA Futsal World Cup. The play-offs were originally scheduled to be played on 9 and 12 April 2020, but had been postponed due to the COVID-19 pandemic, initially to a later date tentatively between June and mid-August. The matches were rescheduled to be played between 2 and 11 November 2020.

Qualified teams for FIFA Futsal World Cup

The following seven teams from UEFA qualify for the 2021 FIFA Futsal World Cup, including Lithuania which qualified as hosts.
TeamQualified asQualified onPrevious appearances in FIFA Futsal World Cup1
26.10.20180
2 2 20205
4 2 20208
1 2 20206
5 2 20202
TBD
TBD

Top goalscorers

  • Preliminary round:
  • Main round:
  • Elite round:
RankPlayerTotal
1 Douglas Júnior—44—8
1 Mats Velseboer62——8
1 Anel Radmilović71——8
4 Alessandro Facchinetti43——7
4 Nermin Kahvedžić61——7
4 Ramadan Alaj61——7
4 Cristian Obadă61——7
8 Fernando Cardinal—42—6
8 Kristjan Čujec—42—6
8 Taynan—42—6
8 Miika Hosio2226
8 Tomáš Drahovský—51—6
8 Andrei Negara33——6
8 Valentin Dujacquier42——6
8 Thales42——6
8 Sergiu Tacot51——6