The European Quidditch Cup, also known as EQC and formerly as the European Quidditch Championship,^[1] is the culminating championship tournament for the sport of quidditch in Europe. It began to be legitimised in 2014 when the International Quidditch Association became an international federation for quidditch. The first tournament took place in 2012 in France as quidditch began to develop across Europe. Today, the tournament is the highest level of championship in Europe besides the European Games with league-level tournaments being the qualifying competitions. In 2019, Division 1 of EQC was held in Harelbeke, Belgium, where the Paris Titans won the championship for the fourth time in their history.^[2][3]

History

Originally held in Lesparre-Médoc, France, EQC has since grown into the largest quidditch tournament in Europe. EQC 2014 saw teams from almost more countries than the 2014 Global Games, and EQC 2015 received teams from at least twelve different quidditch-playing nations.^[4]

Qualification

EQC 2015 saw a different form of qualification than its predecessors that introduced a team limit to the tournament as well as qualification guidelines. The Quidditch Europe committee has planned to change the qualification format for EQC 2016 and onward. Currently, the committee for EQC is distributing bids to individual nations based on discussions with NGBs' representatives and team pre-registration. It is for each national governing body of quidditch to determine how individual bids will be partitioned to teams under their jurisdiction.

Going forward starting with the 2018–19 season, the European Quidditch Cup is held in two divisions, Division 1 and Division 2, in order to facilitate both highly competitive gameplay at the top end and the ever-growing player base in Europe overall.^[5]

Hosts

Lesparre-Médoc

Brussels

Oxford

Gallipoli

Mechelen

Pfaffenhofen a.d. Ilm

Harelbeke

Warsaw (Div 2)

Locations of the European Quidditch Cups

EQC 2018 was held in Pfaffenhofen an der Ilm, Germany.

2017's edition of the tournament was held in the Belgian city of Mechelen after Gallipoli 2016.

EQC 2015 was being hosted by Oxford University's quidditch club and QuidditchUK.^[6] EQC 2014 was hosted by the then-Belgium Muggle Quidditch (current: Belgian Quidditch Federation) and the Brussels Qwaffles. The first EQC was hosted by the then-French Quidditch Association (current: Fédération du quidditch français).^[7]

Selection procedures

Interested teams or NGBs submit a bid proposal outlining their location, the cost and the benefits attached to their bid to a sub-committee composed of Quidditch Europe members. The sub-committee then chooses the bid and selects from an applicant pool the tournament director.

Past champions of Division 1

Year	Host		Winner	Score	Runner-up		Third place	Score	Fourth place		Number of teams
2012[8]	Lesparre-Médoc		Paris Phénix	50*–20	Paris Frog		Milano Meneghins	120*–70	Anthéna Lesparre		6
2014[9]	Brussels		Radcliffe Chimeras	100*–30	Paris Phénix		Brussels Qwaffles	50*–20	Lunatica QC		12
2015	Oxford		Paris Titans	150*–80	Radcliffe Chimeras		Not played Southampton QC1 vs. Nottingham Nightmares				32
2016	Gallipoli		Paris Titans	120*–60	Deurne Dodo A (Antwerp QC)		Not played METU Unicorns vs. Nottingham Nightmares				40
2017	Mechelen		Antwerp QC	120*–110	METU Unicorns		Werewolves of London	80*–60	NTNUI Rumpeldunk		32
2018	Pfaffenhofen an der Ilm		Paris Titans	130*–70	Antwerp QC		METU Unicorns	160°*–140*°	Velociraptors QC		32
2019	Harelbeke		Paris Titans	170*–90	METU Unicorns		Werewolves of London	170*–80	ODTU Hippogriffs		32
2022	Limerick		Werewolves of London	100*–60	DNA Quidditch		Paris Titans	140*–50	Paris Frog		32
2023	Heidelberg		Antwerp QC	130*-30	Werewolves of London		Rurh Phoenix	140*-70	Braunschweiger Broomicorns		32

Rank	Team	Champion	Runner-up	Third place	Total
1	Paris Titans	4	0	1	5
2	Antwerp QC	2	2	0	4
3	Werewolves of London	1	1	2	4
4	Paris Phénix	1	1	0	2
	Radcliffe Chimeras	1	1	0	2
6	METU Unicorns	0	2	2	4
7	Paris Frog	0	1	0	1
	DNA Quidditch	0	1	0	1
9	Nottingham Nightmares	0	0	2	2
10	Milano Meneghins	0	0	1	1
	Brussels Qwaffles	0	0	1	1
	Southampton QC1	0	0	1	1
13	Rurh Phoenix	0	0	1	1

Past champions of Division 2

Year	Host		Winner	Score	Runner-up		Third place	Score	Fourth place		Number of teams
2019	Warsaw		SCC Berlin Bluecaps	120*–50	LSV Looping Lux Leipzig		Vienna Vanguards	190°°°–180*°°	Augsburg Owls		16
2022	Brescia		Dementores A Coruña	200*–130	Bielefelder Basilisken		Southsea Quidditch	120–90*	Kraków Dragons		24
2023	Golbey		Sevilla Warriors QT	160*–90	Münster Marauders		Vienna Vanguards	110*–40	Darmstadt Athenas		24

Rank	Team	Champion	Runner-up	Third place	Total
1	SCC Berlin Bluecaps	1	0	0	1
	Dementores A Coruña
3	LSV Looping Lux Leipzig	0	1	0	1
	Bielefelder Basilisken
5	Vienna Vanguards	0	0	1	1
	Southsea Quidditch