Europe’s busy summer of beach handball events continues this week as the U17 Beach Handball EURO begins in Croatia, before the Beach Handball EURO 2017 for senior teams takes place from June 20 to 25.

 

Both events will be held at Jarun Lake, just south of the centre of Zagreb, with a total of 27 teams contesting the U17 men’s and women’s competitions and 29 nations vying for the senior EURO titles.

 

The U17 Beach Handball EURO starts on Friday and finishes on Sunday, where the Spain men’s side and Netherlands women’s team will fight to defend their titles won at the U16 Beach Handball EURO in Portugal last year.

 

The competition begins with a group phase, with three playing groups of five teams in the men’s tournament and two groups of six in the women’s. After the preliminary round are the quarter-finals, before the semi-finals and finals take place on Sunday.

 

Croatia and Hungary ready to defend titles at Beach Handball EURO 2017

 

Two days later the premier event begins, with the senior competition featuring a group phase and main round before the knock-out stage starts with the quarter-finals. The men’s competition sees the top four teams in each preliminary round group qualifying for the main round, from where all teams proceed to the quarter-finals. This stage is therefore to determine ranking and quarter-final pairings.

 

In the women’s tournament, the top four teams in each preliminary round group earn places in the main round, which will be contested with two groups of six nations. The top four teams in each main round group will qualify for the quarter-finals.

 

In the senior competition, Croatia aim to defend their men’s title won in 2015 while Hungary hope to reclaim their crown from two years ago. In 2015, the men’s silver medal was won by Spain and bronze went to Ukraine. The women’s competition finished with Norway second and Italy third.