The 2024 UEFA European Football Championship final tournament will be the seventeenth European Championships and will be held in Germany between 14 June and 14 July 2024.
- 1. Host selection
- 2. Qualifying
- 3. Wales and the 2024 European Championship
- i. Qualification
- ii. Play Off
- 4. Wales players used during qualifying
On 8 March 2017, UEFA announced that only two countries, Germany and Turkey, had announced their intentions to host the tournament before the deadline of 3 March 2017. At the UEFA Executive Committee meeting on 27 September 2018 in Nyon, Switzerland, Germany secured 12 votes to Turkey's four votes with one abstention.
53 UEFA members entered the qualification tournament for the 2024 UEFA European Football Championship with Germany qualifying automatically as hosts.
Russia were banned from competing due to their suspension from FIFA and UEFA following the Russian invasion of Ukraine in 2022.
The draw for the final tournament was held on 9 October 2022 in Frankfurt, Germany with Wales in the second pot of seeds and were drawn into Group D alongside Croatia, Armenia, Turkey and Latvia.
Uefa qualifying group D
| no. | date | score | scorers (wales) | venue | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 25/03/2023 | Armenia 1-2 Turkey | Vazgen Sargsyan Republican Stadium, Yerevan | ECQ | ||
| 698 | 25/03/2023 | Croatia 1-1 Wales | Broadhead | Stadion Poljud, Split | ECQ |
| 28/03/2023 | Turkey 0-2 Croatia | Bursa Metropolitan Stadium, Bursa | ECQ | ||
| 699 | 28/03/2023 | Wales 1-0 Latvia | Moore | Cardiff City Stadium, Cardiff | ECQ |
| 16/06/2023 | Latvia 2-3 Turkey | Skonto Stadium, Riga | ECQ | ||
| 700 | 16/06/2023 | Wales 2-4 Armenia | James, Wilson | Cardiff City Stadium, Cardiff | ECQ |
| 19/06/2023 | Armenia 2-1 Latvia | Vazgen Sargsyan Republican Stadium, Yerevan | ECQ | ||
| 701 | 19/06/2023 | Turkey 2-0 Wales | Samsun 19 Mayıs Stadium, Samsun | ECQ | |
| 08/09/2023 | Croatia 5-0 Latvia | Stadion Rujevica, Rijeka | ECQ | ||
| 08/09/2023 | Turkey 1-1 Armenia | New Eskişehir Stadium, Eskişehir | ECQ | ||
| 11/09/2023 | Armenia 0-1 Croatia | Vazgen Sargsyan Republican Stadium, Yerevan | ECQ | ||
| 703 | 11/09/2023 | Latvia 0-2 Wales | Ramsey (pen), Brookes | Skonto Stadions, Riga | ECQ |
| 12/10/2023 | Croatia 0-1 Turkey | Opus Arena, Osijek | ECQ | ||
| 12/10/2023 | Latvia 2-0 Armenia | Skonto Stadium, Riga | ECQ | ||
| 15/10/2023 | Turkey 4-0 Latvia | New Adana Stadium, Adana | ECQ | ||
| 705 | 15/10/2023 | Wales 2-1 Croatia | Wilson (2) | Cardiff City Stadium, Cardiff | ECQ |
| 706 | 18/11/2023 | Armenia 1-1 Wales | o.g. | Vazgen Sargsyan Republican Stadium, Yerevan | ECQ |
| 18/11/2023 | Latvia 0-2 Croatia | Skonto Stadium, Riga | ECQ | ||
| 21/11/2023 | Croatia 1-0 Armenia | Stadion Maksimir, Zagreb | ECQ | ||
| 707 | 21/11/2023 | Wales 1-1 Turkey | Williams | Cardiff City Stadium, Cardiff | ECQ |
Group standings
| P | W | D | L | F | A | Pts | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1. | Turkey | 8 | 5 | 2 | 1 | 14 | 7 | 17 |
| 2. | Croatia | 8 | 5 | 1 | 2 | 13 | 4 | 16 |
| 3. | Wales | 8 | 3 | 3 | 2 | 10 | 10 | 12 |
| 4. | Armenia | 8 | 2 | 2 | 4 | 9 | 11 | 8 |
| 5. | Latvia | 8 | 1 | 0 | 7 | 5 | 19 | 3 |
Four teams each from UEFA Nations Leagues A, B and C who had not already qualified for Euro 2024 progressed to the play-offs of their league. The play-off berths were first allocated to each Nations League group winner, and if any of the group winners already qualify for the European Championship finals, then to the next-best ranked team of the league.
Poland and Wales were the only two teams from League A not to qualify and were placed in Path A along with the best-ranked League D group winner and one non-group winner from League B.
Wales were drawn to face Finlad at home with the winners facing the winners of the second Path A match, Poland v Estonia, at home for a place at Euro 2024.
Play-off Semi Finals
| no. | date | score | scorers (wales) | venue | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 708 | 21/03/2024 | Wales 4-1 Finland | Brooks, Williams, Johnson, D James | Cardiff City Stadium, Cardiff | ECQ |
| 21/03/2024 | Poland 5-1 Estonia | Stadion Narodowy, Warsaw | ECQ |
Play-off Final
| 709 | 26/03/2024 | Wales 0-0 Poland (Poland win 5-4 on Pens) | Cardiff City Stadium, Cardiff | ECQ |
Wales and the 2024 European Championship
Wales were placed in the second pot of seeds and were drawn into Group D alongside Croatia, Armenia, Turkey and Latvia.
Prior to the opening game taking place Wales saw four senior players retire from international football as Gareth Bale, Joe Allen, Chris Gunter and Jonny Williams called time on their international careers.
Following Bale's retirement, Rob Page appointed Aaron Ramsey as his new captain ahead of the opening match against top seeds, Croatia, in Split.
Despite spending long periods of the game under pressure, Wales came away from Split with a valuable point following debutant, Nathan Broadhead's goal deep into injury time.
A win in Cardiff against bottom seeds Latvia saw Wales take four points from the opening two games, however the June fixtures proved to be disastrous for Wales.
Despite an early Dan James goal against Armenia in Cardiff, Wales fell to a chaotic 2-4 loss to a team ranked 97th in the FIFA rankings and to rub salt into the wounds Kieffer Moore recived a red card from the Bulgarian referee for attempting to kick the Armenian goalkeeper.
At the same time as Wales fans were shaking their heads in disbelief, Latvia thought they had secured their first point of the campaign as Kristers Tobers scored their second of the night to make it 2-2 in the fourth minute of stoppage time but Turkey found a winner a minute later to take them to the top of the group.
Wales had a chance to make amends for their shock defeat when travelling to Samsun on the Black Sea coast to face Turkey three days later, however, a second red card in as many games, this time shown to Joe Morrell, saw Wales play most of the game with 10 men.
Despite having two goals ruled out by VAR and seeing Danny Ward save Hakan Çalhanoğlu's penalty, Turkey finally found a way through, scoring two goals in the final 20 minutes to leave Wales' hopes of reaching Euro 2024 severly dented.
In September, Armenia followed up their victory in Cardiff with a draw in Turkey, taking them to within three points of Croatia who thumped Latvia 5-0 on the same evening.
Wales travelled to Latvia needing a win to keep alive any hopes of qualifying automatically for Euro 2024 and an early Aaron Ramsey penalty settled Welsh nerves before David Brooks scored his first international goal in nearly three years, and his first since recovering from cancer, to ensure a 2-0 win.
Two goals from Harry Wilson saw Wales defeat Croatia for the first time in their history to put automatic qualification hopes back in their own hands on a rousing night at the Cardiff City Stadium.
However, Armenia proved to be a thorn in Wales' side for the second time in the group as a 1-1 draw in Yerevan meant Wales, once again, were reliant on other results in order to qualify automatically.
Needing to better Croatia's result against Armenia on the same evening, Wales had the perfect start against Turkey as Neco Williams rifled home after just seven minutes, however Wales were left feeling hard done after the referee waved away three possible penalty appeals during the first half before awarding a controversial penalty against Ben Davies in the second half.
Croatia's victory over Armenia meant the result in Cardiff was immaterial with Wales having to go through the Play Offs in order to reach Euro 2024.
Wales were placed in Path A of the play-offs by virtue of being one of only two teams from League A of the 2022/23 Nations League not to have qualified automatically for the Finals.
Wales were drawn to face Finland, one of League B's non group winners, at home, with the winners of the semi-final facing the winners of Poland v Estonia at home in the play-off final.
A comfortable 4-1 win at the Cardiff City Stadium which saw Dan James grab the fourth goal on his 50th appearance meant Wales would face Poland in the final following their 5-1 rout of Estonia.
Players used during qualifying
Wales used 21 players during the campaign with Danny Ward and Ethan Ampadu playing every minute of every match. Connor Roberts, Joe Rodon, Neco Williams and Harry Wilson also played some part of every match.
Nathan Broadhead and Jordan James won their first caps against Croatia in Split, whilst Ollie Cooper made his first appearance in the home game against Latvia.
| Player | CRO | LAT | ARM | TUR | LAT | CRO | ARM | TUR | FIN | POL |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Ethan Ampadu | 90 | 90 | 90 | 90 | 90 | 90 | 90 | 90 | 90 | 120 |
| Tom Bradshaw | 20 | 9 | 28 | 3 | ||||||
| Nathan Broadhead | 26 | 17 | 9 | 6 | 10 | 12 | 61 | 1 | 8 | |
| David Brooks | 20 | 41 | 57 | 50 | 29 | 60 | 28 | |||
| Wes Burns | 26 | |||||||||
| Ben Cabango | 1 | 45 | ||||||||
| Ollie Cooper | 1 | |||||||||
| Ben Davies | 90 | 90 | 90 | 90 | 90 | 90 | 120 | |||
| Dan James | 64 | 73 | 81 | 62 | 33 | 24 | 20 | 18 | 50 | |
| Jordan James | 1 | 6 | 90 | 90 | 90 | 90 | 90 | 120 | ||
| Brennan Johnson | 70 | 45 | 87 | 40 | 90 | 72 | 70 | |||
| Chris Mepham | 90 | 90 | 90 | 90 | 90 | 90 | 90 | 90 | 120  | |
| Kieffer Moore | 72 | 90 | 77 | 90 | 90 | 6 | 30 | 120 | ||
| Joe Morrell | 89 | 90 | 24 | 41 | ||||||
| Aaron Ramsey | 64 | 89 | 66 | 84 | 49 | |||||
| Connor Roberts | 90 | 90 | 90 | 90 | 90 | 90 | 78 | 90 | 90 | 84 |
| Joe Rodon | 90 | 90 | 66 | 90 | 90 | 90 | 90 | 90 | 90 | 120 |
| Sorba Thomas | 26 | |||||||||
| Danny Ward | 90 | 90 | 90 | 90 | 90 | 90 | 90 | 90 | 90 | 120 |
| Neco Williams | 90 | 90 | 24 | 90 | 90 | 90 | 90 | 84 | 90 | 120 |
| Harry Wilson | 64 | 89 | 72 | 84 | 90 | 80 | 66 | 80 | 89 | 120 |
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