The results of the draws for rugby sevens, futsal and handball are known

The competition draws for the next three 2024 FISU World University Championships involving team sports have just taken place, promising a lot of excitement during the whole month of June respectively in Aix-en-Provence (FRA), Shanghai (CHN) and Antequera (ESP).

All participating countries were anxiously waiting for the results for the draws for next month’s team sports championships, respectively in Aix-en-Provence (10-12 June), in Shanghai (10-16 June) and in Antequera (28-30 June).

Rugby Sevens

In 27 days, the Maurice David Stadium, home of the professional rugby club Provence Rugby, will welcome ten women’s teams and ten men’s teams from a total of 13 countries to compete during thrilling seven minute games. A World University Championship sport since 2004, Rugby Sevens has also featured as an optional sport at the Summer Games.

In the men’s tournament, the 2019 FISU Summer Universiade winners Japan will face the bronze medalists France in Group A. In Group B, the 2019 FISU Summer Universiade runner-ups, South Africa will play Argentina, who finished that competition in fifth place. India and Singapore, both new competitors, will be excited teams to follow.

Japan also won the women’s competition during the 2019 FISU Summer Universiade. They will avoid facing the runner-ups France during the group phase. India and Mexico are the new participants of this year’s women’s tournament.

Futsal

Futsal is one of the top sports in the World University Championships programme, with a significant interest from countries to participate and a high technical level. This edition in China is no exception, with teams from all five continents – 14 in the men’s tournament and 7 in the women’s – competing in Shanghai from June 10th.

The top eight teams of the previous Championship edition were seeded and no more than two countries from Asia and Europe could end up in the same group. The men’s tournament has participants from all five continents with the presence of Morocco.

With a smaller representation of countries, the women’s participants are only divided into two groups, lead respectively by China and Portugal, the top two ranked teams, according to the 2022 FISU World Cup Futsal results.

Handball

Handball was the first sport ever organised as a FISU World University Championship, in 1963, in the Swedish city of Lund. In 2022, the event adopted the FISU University World Cup format (where universities compete instead of countries) in Pristina, Kosovo. It will return to the FISU World University Championship format in 2024 in Antequera, Spain.

Spain, Czechia, France, Poland, Chile and India will be represented in both the men’s and the women’s tournaments. But this first draw also concerned Brazil, who will not play fellow American Chile in the group phase.

No team from Brazil in the women’s competition, but one from the Netherlands, making this tournament an almost fully European one, apart from India and Chile, who didn’t end in the same group for obvious reasons.

Written by Thérèse Courvoisier