The 2016 UEFA European Under-17 Championship qualification was a men's under-17 football competition organised by UEFA to determine the 15 national teams joining the automatically qualified hosts Azerbaijan in the 2016 UEFA European Under-17 Championship final tournament.[1]
A total of 53 national teams entered this qualifying competition, which was played in two rounds between September 2015 and April 2016.[2] Players born on or after 1 January 1999 were eligible to participate. Each match had a duration of 80 minutes, consisting of two halves of 40 minutes with a 15-minute half-time.
Format
The qualifying competition consisted of two rounds:[3]
Qualifying round: Apart from Germany, which received a bye to the elite round as the team with the highest seeding coefficient, the remaining 52 teams were drawn into 13 groups of four teams. Each group was played in single round-robin format at one of the teams selected as hosts after the draw. The 13 group winners, the 13 runners-up, and the five third-placed teams with the best record against the first and second-placed teams in their group advanced to the elite round.
Elite round: The 32 teams were drawn into eight groups of four teams. Each group was played in single round-robin format at one of the teams selected as hosts after the draw. The eight group winners and the seven runners-up with the best record against the first and third-placed teams in their group qualified for the final tournament.
Tiebreakers
The teams were ranked according to points (3 points for a win, 1 point for a draw, 0 points for a loss). If two or more teams were equal on points on completion of a mini-tournament, the following tie-breaking criteria were applied, in the order given, to determine the rankings:[3]
Higher number of points obtained in the mini-tournament matches played among the teams in question;
Superior goal difference resulting from the mini-tournament matches played among the teams in question;
Higher number of goals scored in the mini-tournament matches played among the teams in question;
If, after having applied criteria 1 to 3, teams still had an equal ranking, criteria 1 to 3 were reapplied exclusively to the mini-tournament matches between the teams in question to determine their final rankings. If this procedure did not lead to a decision, criteria 5 to 9 applied;
Superior goal difference in all mini-tournament matches;
Higher number of goals scored in all mini-tournament matches;
If only two teams had the same number of points, and they were tied according to criteria 1 to 6 after having met in the last round of the mini-tournament, their rankings were determined by a penalty shoot-out (not used if more than two teams had the same number of points, or if their rankings were not relevant for qualification for the next stage).
Lower disciplinary points total based only on yellow and red cards received in the mini-tournament matches (red card = 3 points, yellow card = 1 point, expulsion for two yellow cards in one match = 3 points);
Drawing of lots.
To determine the five best third-placed teams from the qualifying round and the seven best runners-up from the elite round, the results against the teams in fourth place were discarded. The following criteria were applied:[3]
Higher number of points;
Superior goal difference;
Higher number of goals scored;
Lower disciplinary points total based only on yellow and red cards received (red card = 3 points, yellow card = 1 point, expulsion for two yellow cards in one match = 3 points);
Drawing of lots.
Qualifying round
Draw
The draw for the qualifying round was held on 3 December 2014, 09:00 CET (UTC+1), at the UEFA headquarters in Nyon, Switzerland.[4][5]
The teams were seeded according to their coefficient ranking, calculated based on the following:[6][7]
To determine the five best third-placed teams from the qualifying round advancing to the elite round, only the results of the third-placed teams against the first and second-placed teams in their group were taken into account.
The draw for the elite round was held on 3 December 2015, 11:45 CET (UTC+1), at the UEFA headquarters in Nyon, Switzerland.[8][9]
The teams were seeded according to their results in the qualifying round.[10]Germany, which received a bye to the elite round, were automatically seeded into Pot A. Each group contained one team from Pot A, one team from Pot B, one team from Pot C, and one team from Pot D. Winners and runners-up from the same qualifying round group could not be drawn in the same group, but third-placed teams could be drawn in the same group as winners or runners-up from the same qualifying round group. For political reasons, Russia and Ukraine (due to the Russian military intervention in Ukraine) could not be drawn in the same group.[11]
To determine the seven best second-placed teams from the elite round qualifying for the final tournament, only the results of the second-placed teams against the first and third-placed teams in their group were taken into account.
João Filipe (7 goals)
