The ISF, Socca Moldova and the FMF are pleased to announce that the official European Championship, Socca EuroCup will be returning to the Moldovan capital city of Chisinau in 2024 after an agreement was reached to continue the hugely successful tournament. The event will take place in May 8th-12th 2024.
In 2023, the ISF and Socca Moldova were proud to bring the first ever Socca EuroCup to the Socca family.
Over 5 days, between Wednesday 29th March and Sunday 2nd June, we saw 13 teams from across Europe facing off against each other to qualify for the Socca World Cup and be crowned Socca EuroCup Champions. In the qualifying section of the competition, we saw Romania and Georgia finish as group winners and automatically qualify for the World Cup in Essen, while newcomers Albania and Cyprus played in the 3rd place match, with Albania winning to secure the final qualifying slot for the World Cup. In the main competition, we saw Georgia and Croatia facing off in the 3rd place match, with Croatia winning 1-0 to take the bronze medal place. In the final, Kazakhstan and Romania, who had looked the two strongest teams throughout, played each other. In a tense match, the game finished as a draw and went to Socca Penalties. World Cup 2022 runners up Kazakhstan managed to finally better their opposition, winning 2-1 on Socca Pens and claiming the right of first ever Socca EuroCup winners.
The Socca EuroCup will return in 2024 to the Moldovan capital with a slightly different format, as all European teams that will participate will compete in one solid tournament without separate sections (qualifying and main one). Following the format of the Socca Copa America, the European Championship will include all teams in groups without any limitation at the draw procedure. Europe has already secured 20 slots for the Socca World Cup. The first 15 teams of the European ranking have directly qualified and the rest 5 slots will be granted to 5 countries after their performance in the Socca EuroCup. The EuroCup will include at least 11 countries that have not qualified (apart from all other participating countries that have already qualified) and the 5 best ones out of those 11 will secure their position to the World Cup in Oman 6 months later.
Socca EuroCup will be transmitted live all over the world and some of the biggest TV stations around the globe have already secured the TV rights.