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Laman Ismayilova

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The Azerbaijani futsal national team will play its next match in the main stage of the UEFA European Futsal Championship on January 31, Azernews reports.

The team, which is in Group 5, will face the Croatian national team. The match will take place at the Mate Parlov Sports Center in Pula at 22:15 (Baku time).

Recall that Azerbaijani futsal team drew 3:3 with Sweden in its first match in the main stage.

The UEFA European Futsal Championship is the main futsal competition of the men's national futsal teams governed by UEFA (the Union of European Football Associations)

The first tournament was held in Spain in 1996 and featured only six teams. The tournament was expanded to eight teams in 1999 and held every two years, and further to 12 teams in 2010.

After 2018, the tournament was expanded to 16 teams and held every four years, to avoid leap years when the FIFA Futsal World Cup is being played. The first 16-team tournament was held in 2022 in the Netherlands.

Notably, futsal is a ball sport played on a hard court, smaller than a football pitch, and mainly indoors. It has similarities to five-a-side football.

The game is played between two teams of five players each, one of whom is the goalkeeper. Unlike some other forms of indoor football, the game is played on a hard court surface delimited by lines; walls or boards are not used.

Azerbaijan had qualified for the FIFA Futsal World Cup for the first time in 2016.

Now the futsal team successfully represents Azerbaijan at multiple international futsal competitions such as the FIFA Futsal World Cup and the European Championships.

The team was ranked 14th in the world, the highest-ranking team from Caucasus in the World Rankings.