Three teams compete Tuesday for the last tournament places in the EURO 2024 play-offs

The tension builds as six sides compete for the final three coveted slots in the tournament through the play-offs on Tuesday (tomorrow), with UEFA EURO 2024 rapidly approaching.

The UEFA EURO 2024 is scheduled to begin on Friday, June 14, in Munich, Germany, and conclude with the final in Berlin on Sunday, July 14, 2024, according to PUNCH Online.

The bid to host the 2024 European Championship was won by Germany in 2018 after UEFA supported their proposal, which was deemed more secure than the Turkish one.

With thrilling matches and exciting head-to-heads setting the scene, European football fans are ready for the thrilling qualification phase’s conclusion.

With the semi-finals on March 21 coming to a conclusion, focus is turning to the finals on March 26, where thrilling matches will determine the winners.

Here’s an overview of how these play-offs operate, the current situation, and what the winning teams may expect on the main stage of EURO 2024.

In the UEFA EURO 2024 play-offs in March, six clubs out of 12 are still in contention, and three last-minute spots to the championship event are up for grabs.

The 24-team EURO finals lineup was completed by the three winning teams from the six semi-final matches that were played on March 21. The victors of those matches went on to play in three finals on March 26.

What are the play-off results and fixtures?
Semi-finals (March 21)
Path A: Poland 5-1 Estonia, Wales 4-1 Finland
Path B: Israel 1-4 Iceland, Bosnia and Herzegovina 1-2 Ukraine
Path C: Georgia 2-0 Luxembourg, Greece 5-0 Kazakhstan

Finals ( March 26)
Path A: Wales vs. Poland (20:45 CET)
Path B: Ukraine vs. Iceland (20:45 CET)
Path C: Georgia vs. Greece (18:00 CET)

The drawings for the six groups of the UEFA EURO 2024 took place on December 2, 2023. Italy, the current champions, were drawn into the same group as Spain, France faced the Netherlands, while England avoided any of the most difficult opponents.

Group A: Germany, Scotland, Hungary, Switzerland
Group B: Spain, Croatia, Italy, Albania
Group C: Slovenia, Denmark, Serbia, England
Group D: Play-Off Winner Path A, Netherlands, Austria, France
Group E: Slovakia, Romania, Play-Off Winner Path B
Group F: Türkiye, Play-Off Winner Path C, Portugal, Czechia

The UEFA website states that all play-off matches are single-leg knockout competitions. If there are ties at the conclusion of regulation time, extra time and, if necessary, a penalty shoot-out will be used.

The playoffs—are they new?
For six of the previous seven EUROs, there have been play-offs. However, the format of the UEFA EURO 2020 play-offs was different.

Teams had to advance through multiple rounds for the first time, and in contrast to all prior editions, teams qualified through the Nations League rather than the European Qualifiers.

This is the third time that single-leg matches have been used in the European play-offs for the FIFA World Cup. The same system was used for the 2022 FIFA World Cup, albeit only two Nations League teams and ten European Qualifiers group runners-up advanced.