UEFA Euro 1992

1992 UEFA European Football Championship

Europamästerskapet i fotboll Sverige 1992
Small is Beautiful
Tournament details
Host country	Sweden
Dates	10–26 June
Teams	8
Venue(s)	4 (in 4 host cities)
Final positions
Champions	Denmark (1st title)
Runners-up	Germany
Tournament statistics
Matches played	15
Goals scored	32 (2.13 per match)
Attendance	430,111 (28,674 per match)
Top scorer(s)	Henrik Larsen Karl-Heinz Riedle Dennis Bergkamp Tomas Brolin (3 goals each)
← 1988 1996 →

The 1992 UEFA European Football Championship was hosted by Sweden between 10 and 26 June 1992. It was the ninth UEFA European Championship, which is held every four years and supported by UEFA.

Denmark won the 1992 championship, having been invited as qualifiers runners-ups only after Yugoslavia was disqualified as a result of the breakup of the country and the ensuing warfare there. Eight national teams contested the final tournament. ^[1]

The CIS national football team (Commonwealth of Independent States), representing the recently dissolved Soviet Union, whose national team had qualified for the tournament, were present at the tournament. It was also the first major tournament in which the reunified Germany (who were beaten 2–0 by Denmark in the final) had competed.

It was the last tournament with only eight participants, to award the winner of a match with only two points, and before the introduction of the back-pass rule, the latter of which was brought in immediately after the tournament was completed. When the next competition was held in 1996, 16 teams were involved and were awarded three points for a win.

Bid process

On 16 December 1988, following a decision made by the UEFA Executive Committee, Sweden was chosen over Spain to host the event. ^[2] Spain was at a disadvantage as they had already been chosen to host the EXPO 1992 in Seville and the 1992 Summer Olympics in Barcelona. ^{[2] [3]}

Summary

Seven of the eight teams had to qualify for the final stage; Sweden qualified automatically as hosts of the event. ^[4] The Soviet Union qualified for the final tournament shortly before the break-up of the country, and took part in the tournament under the banner of the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS), ^[5] before the former Soviet republics formed their own national teams after the competition. The CIS team represented the following former Soviet nations: Russia, Ukraine, Belarus, Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan, Kyrgyzstan, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Moldova, and Tajikistan. Four out of 15 ex-republics were not members of the CIS: Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania did not send their players; Georgia was not a member of the CIS at the time, but Georgian Kakhaber Tskhadadze was a part of the squad. Of the remaining 19 players, 15 were Russian (four of which being born in Ukraine and one, Akhrik Tsveiba being Georgian by birth), three were Ukrainian and only one, Sergei Aleinikov, was Belarusian.

Originally, Yugoslavia qualified for the final stage and were about to participate as FR Yugoslavia, but due to the Yugoslav Wars, the team was disqualified and Denmark, as the runners-up from Yugoslavia's qualifying group, was invited to take part instead. ^[6] After a draw with England and a loss to host nation Sweden, Denmark beat France in their final group match to qualify for the semi-finals, where they faced the reigning European champions, the Netherlands. Denmark led 2–1 going into the last five minutes, but a Frank Rijkaard equaliser meant the game went to a penalty shoot-out; Danish goalkeeper Peter Schmeichel saved Marco van Basten's kick, giving Denmark a 5–4 win on penalties and a place in the final against the reigning world champions, Germany. ^[7] Denmark won the final 2–0 with goals from John Jensen and Kim Vilfort in either half to claim their first European title. ^[8]

Qualification

Main article: UEFA Euro 1992 qualifying

Scotland and the hosts Sweden made their respective debuts despite having already made many appearances at the World Cup. France qualified for the first Euro in which they were not the hosts. They played after missing the previous tournament.

As of 2024, this was the last time that both the Czech Republic and Slovakia (until 2016) (then Czechoslovakia), Italy, Portugal, and Spain failed to qualify for the European Championship finals.

Qualified teams

Team	Qualified as	Qualified on	Previous appearances in tournament [A]
Sweden	Host	16 December 1988	0 (debut)
France	Group 1 winner	12 October 1991	2 ( 1960 , 1984 )
England	Group 7 winner	13 November 1991	3 (1968, 1980, 1988)
CIS [B]	Group 3 winner [C]	13 November 1991	5 ( 1960 , 1964, 1968, 1972, 1988)
Scotland	Group 2 winner	20 November 1991	0 (debut)
Netherlands	Group 6 winner	4 December 1991	3 (1976, 1980, 1988 )
Germany [D]	Group 5 winner	18 December 1991	5 ( 1972 , 1976, 1980 , 1984, 1988 )
Denmark	Group 4 runner-up [E]	31 May 1992	3 (1964, 1984, 1988)

1. Bold indicates champion for that year. Italic indicates host for that year.
2. From 1960 to 1988, CIS competed as the Soviet Union.
3. Replaced the Soviet Union.
4. From 1972 to 1988, Germany competed as West Germany.
5. Replaced FR Yugoslavia (after qualifying as Yugoslavia), who were subject to sanctions under UN Security Council Resolution 757 and thus banned from appearing. ^[9]

Final draw

The draw for the final tournament took place on 17 January 1992 in Gothenburg. Only two teams were seeded: Sweden (as hosts) and the Netherlands (as holders). ^{[10] [11]} The remaining six teams were all unseeded and could be drawn in any group. Months after the draw, Yugoslavia was banned from participating and replaced by Denmark, which had come second in the qualifying group.

In the draw procedure, the unseeded teams were drawn one by one. The first two were placed in position 4 of each group, the next two in position 3, and the last 2 in position 2. The two seeded teams were then drawn and placed consecutively into position 1 of the groups.

Pot 1: Seeded teams	Pot 2: Unseeded teams
Sweden (hosts) [a]   Netherlands (holders) [b]	CIS   England	France   Germany	Scotland   Yugoslavia [c]

1. Hosts Sweden were automatically assigned to position A1.
2. Defending champions the Netherlands were automatically assigned to position B1.
3. Yugoslavia were to participate in the final tournament as FR Yugoslavia. However, the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia was placed under sanctions on 30 May 1992 by the United Nations Security Council Resolution 757 after the outbreak of Yugoslav Wars. ^[9] FIFA and UEFA therefore suspended FR Yugoslavia from competitive football on 31 May 1992, meaning they could not participate in the final tournament. Denmark instead took the spot at the final tournament.

The draw resulted in the following groups: ^[12]

Group 1   Sweden   France   Yugoslavia →   Denmark   England

Group 2   Netherlands   Scotland   CIS   Germany

Venues

Gothenburg	Gothenburg Stockholm Malmö Norrköping	Stockholm
Ullevi		Råsunda Stadium
Capacity: 44,000		Capacity: 40,000
Malmö		Norrköping
Malmö Stadion		Idrottsparken
Capacity: 30,000		Capacity: 23,000

Squads

Main article: UEFA Euro 1992 squads

Each national team had to submit a squad of 20 players.

Match ball

Adidas Etrusco Unico was used as the official match ball of the tournament. The ball was previously used in the 1990 FIFA World Cup.

Match officials

Country	Referee	Linesmen		Matches refereed
Austria	Hubert Forstinger	Johann Möstl	Alois Pemmer	France 1–2 Denmark
Belgium	Guy Goethals	Pierre Mannaerts	Robert Surkijn	Scotland 0–2 Germany
CIS	Alexey Spirin	Victor Filippov	Andrei Butenko	Sweden 1–1 France
Denmark	Peter Mikkelsen	Arne Paltoft	Jørgen Ohmeyer	Netherlands 0–0 CIS
France	Gérard Biguet	Marc Huguenin	Alain Gourdet	CIS 1–1 Germany
Germany	Aron Schmidhuber	Joachim Ren	Uwe Ennuschat	Sweden 1–0 Denmark
Hungary	Sándor Puhl	László Varga	Sándor Szilágyi	France 0–0 England
Italy	Pierluigi Pairetto	Domenico Ramicone	Maurizio Padovan	Netherlands 3–1 Germany
	Tullio Lanese			Sweden 2–3 Germany (Semi-final)
Netherlands	John Blankenstein	Jan Dolstra	Robert Overkleeft	Denmark 0–0 England
Portugal	José Rosa dos Santos	Valdemar Aguiar Pinto Lopes	Antonio Guedes Gomes De Carvalho	Sweden 2–1 England
Spain	Emilio Soriano Aladrén	Francisco García Pacheco	José Luis Iglesia Casas	Netherlands 2–2 Denmark (Semi-final)
Sweden	Bo Karlsson	Lennart Sundqvist	Bo Persson	Netherlands 1–0 Scotland
Switzerland	Kurt Röthlisberger	Zivanko Popović	Paul Wyttenbach	Scotland 3–0 CIS
	Bruno Galler			Denmark 2–0 Germany (Final)

Fourth officials

Country	Fourth officials
Austria	Gerhard Kapl
Belgium	Frans van den Wijngaert
CIS	Vadim Zhuk
Denmark	Kim Milton Nielsen
France	Rémi Harrel
Germany	Karl-Josef Assenmacher
Hungary	Sándor Varga
Netherlands	Mario van der Ende
Portugal	Jorge Emanuel Monteiro Coroado
Sweden	Leif Sundell

Group stage

Results. Yugoslavia (stripes) qualified and were going to participate as FR Yugoslavia, but banned and replaced by Denmark. CIS (yellow on the right side of the map) qualified as Soviet Union.

The teams finishing in the top two positions in each of the two groups progress to the semi-finals, while the bottom two teams in each group were eliminated from the tournament.

All times are local, CEST (UTC+2).

Tiebreakers

If two or more teams finished level on points after completion of the group matches, the following tie-breakers were used to determine the final ranking:

1. Goal difference in all group matches
2. Greater number of goals scored in all group matches
3. Drawing of lots

Group 1

Main article: UEFA Euro 1992 Group 1

Pos	Team v t e	Pld	W	D	L	GF	GA	GD	Pts	Qualification
1	Sweden (H)	3	2	1	0	4	2	+2	5	Advance to knockout stage
2	Denmark	3	1	1	1	2	2	0	3
3	France	3	0	2	1	2	3	−1	2
4	England	3	0	2	1	1	2	−1	2

Source: UEFA
(H) Hosts

10 June 1992 (1992-06-10)

20:15

Sweden	1–1	France
J. Eriksson 24'	Report [13]	Papin 58'

Råsunda Stadium, Solna

Attendance: 29,860

Referee: Alexey Spirin (CIS)

11 June 1992 (1992-06-11)

20:15

Denmark	0–0	England
	Report [14]

Malmö Stadion, Malmö

Attendance: 26,385

Referee: John Blankenstein (Netherlands)

---

14 June 1992 (1992-06-14)

17:15

France	0–0	England
	Report [15]

Malmö Stadion, Malmö

Attendance: 26,535

Referee: Sándor Puhl (Hungary)

14 June 1992 (1992-06-14)

20:15

Sweden	1–0	Denmark
Brolin 58'	Report [16]

Råsunda Stadium, Solna

Attendance: 29,902

Referee: Aron Schmidhuber (Germany)

---

17 June 1992 (1992-06-17)

20:15

Sweden	2–1	England
J. Eriksson 51' Brolin 82'	Report [17]	Platt 4'

Råsunda Stadium, Solna

Attendance: 30,126

Referee: José Rosa dos Santos (Portugal)

17 June 1992 (1992-06-17)

20:15

France	1–2	Denmark
Papin 60'	Report [18]	Larsen 8' Elstrup 78'

Malmö Stadion, Malmö

Attendance: 25,763

Referee: Hubert Forstinger (Austria)

Group 2

Main article: UEFA Euro 1992 Group 2

Pos	Team v t e	Pld	W	D	L	GF	GA	GD	Pts	Qualification
1	Netherlands	3	2	1	0	4	1	+3	5	Advance to knockout stage
2	Germany	3	1	1	1	4	4	0	3
3	Scotland	3	1	0	2	3	3	0	2
4	CIS	3	0	2	1	1	4	−3	2

Source: UEFA

12 June 1992 (1992-06-12)

17:15

Netherlands	1–0	Scotland
Bergkamp 75'	Report

Ullevi, Gothenburg

Attendance: 35,720

Referee: Bo Karlsson (Sweden)

12 June 1992 (1992-06-12)

20:15

CIS	1–1	Germany
Dobrovolski 64' (pen.)	Report	Häßler 90'

Idrottsparken, Norrköping

Attendance: 17,410

Referee: Gérard Biguet (France)

---

15 June 1992 (1992-06-15)

17:15

Scotland	0–2	Germany
	Report	Riedle 29' Effenberg 47'

Idrottsparken, Norrköping

Attendance: 17,638

Referee: Guy Goethals (Belgium)

15 June 1992 (1992-06-15)

20:15

Netherlands	0–0	CIS
	Report

Ullevi, Gothenburg

Attendance: 34,440

Referee: Peter Mikkelsen (Denmark)

---

18 June 1992 (1992-06-18)

20:15

Netherlands	3–1	Germany
Rijkaard 4' Witschge 15' Bergkamp 72'	Report	Klinsmann 53'

Ullevi, Gothenburg

Attendance: 37,725

Referee: Pierluigi Pairetto (Italy)

18 June 1992 (1992-06-18)

20:15

Scotland	3–0	CIS
McStay 7' McClair 16' McAllister 84' (pen.)	Report

Idrottsparken, Norrköping

Attendance: 14,660

Referee: Kurt Röthlisberger (Switzerland)

Knockout stage

Main article: UEFA Euro 1992 knockout stage

In the knockout phase, extra time and a penalty shoot-out were used to decide the winner if necessary. As with every tournament since UEFA Euro 1984, there was no third place play-off.

All times are local, CEST (UTC+2).

Bracket

	Semi-finals				Final
	22 June – Gothenburg
	Netherlands	2 (4)
					26 June – Gothenburg
	Denmark (p)	2 (5)
					Denmark	2
	21 June – Solna
					Germany	0
	Sweden	2
	Germany	3

Semi-finals

21 June 1992 (1992-06-21)

20:15

Sweden	2–3	Germany
Brolin 64' (pen.) K. Andersson 89'	Report	Häßler 11' Riedle 59', 88'

Råsunda Stadium, Solna

Attendance: 28,827

Referee: Tullio Lanese (Italy)

---

22 June 1992 (1992-06-22)

20:15

Netherlands	2–2 (a.e.t.)	Denmark
Bergkamp 23' Rijkaard 86'	Report	Larsen 5', 33'
Penalties
Koeman Van Basten Bergkamp Rijkaard Witschge	4–5	Larsen Povlsen Elstrup Vilfort Christofte

Ullevi, Gothenburg

Attendance: 37,450

Referee: Emilio Soriano Aladrén (Spain)

Final

Main article: UEFA Euro 1992 final

26 June 1992 (1992-06-26)

20:15

Denmark	2–0	Germany
Jensen 18' Vilfort 78'	Report

Ullevi, Gothenburg

Attendance: 37,800 ^[19]

Referee: Bruno Galler (Switzerland)

Statistics

Main article: UEFA Euro 1992 statistics

Goalscorers

There were 32 goals scored in 15 matches, for an average of 2.13 goals per match.

3 goals

• Henrik Larsen
• Karl-Heinz Riedle
• Dennis Bergkamp
• Tomas Brolin

2 goals

• Jean-Pierre Papin
• Thomas Häßler
• Frank Rijkaard
• Jan Eriksson

1 goal

• Igor Dobrovolski
• Lars Elstrup
• John Jensen
• Kim Vilfort
• David Platt
• Stefan Effenberg
• Jürgen Klinsmann
• Rob Witschge
• Gary McAllister
• Brian McClair
• Paul McStay
• Kennet Andersson

Source: UEFA ^[20]

Awards

UEFA Team of the Tournament ^[21]

Goalkeeper	Defenders	Midfielders	Forwards
Peter Schmeichel	Jocelyn Angloma Laurent Blanc Andreas Brehme Jürgen Kohler	Brian Laudrup Stefan Effenberg Thomas Häßler Ruud Gullit	Dennis Bergkamp Marco van Basten

Marketing

Slogan and theme song

Small is Beautiful was the official slogan of the contest. ^[5] The official anthem of the tournament was "More Than a Game", performed by Towe Jaarnek and Peter Jöback.

Logo and identity

It was the last tournament to use the UEFA plus flag logo, and before the tournament was known as "Euro" (it is known as "Euro 1992" only retrospectively). It was also the first major football competition in which the players had their names printed on their backs, around the time that it was becoming a trend in club football across Europe.

Mascot

The official mascot of the competition was a rabbit coincidentally named Rabbit, dressed in a Swedish football jersey, as well as head and wristbands. ^[22]

Sponsorship

Global sponsors	Swedish sponsors
Adidas Canon Carlsberg Coca-Cola Disney Fujifilm General Motors Intel JVC MasterCard McDonald's Opel Philips Ruhrgas Sensodyne Unicef	Föreningssparbanken Saab SAS SJ Swebus Televerket

References

1. Chowdhury, Saj (12 May 2012). "Euro 1992: Denmark's fairytale". BBC Sport. British Broadcasting Corporation. Retrieved 11 June 2012.
2. "Sweden to host 1992 Euro finals". New Straits Times. Reuters. 18 December 1988. Retrieved 16 September 2014.
3. Dietrich Schulze-Marmeling: Die Geschichte der Fußball-Europameisterschaft, Verlag Die Werkstatt, ISBN   978-3-89533-553-2
4. Hughes, Rob (16 October 1991). "Now, the going gets tough". The New York Times. Retrieved 16 September 2014.
5. Hughes, Rob (10 June 1992). "Confidence and flair: Dutch favored in Euro 92". The New York Times. Retrieved 16 September 2014.
6. "Yugoslav athletes banned". The New York Times. 1 June 1992. Retrieved 16 September 2014.
7. Thomsen, Ian (23 June 1992). "Danes upset Dutch in penalty shoot-out, advance to final". The New York Times. Retrieved 16 September 2014.
8. Thomsen, Ian (27 June 1992). "Upstart Danes upend Germany, 2–0, in soccer final". The New York Times. Retrieved 16 September 2014.
9. "United Nations Security Council Resolution 757 (Implementing Trade Embargo on Yugoslavia)". UMN.edu. United Nations. 30 May 1992. Retrieved 18 August 2008.
10. "Duitsland speelt met Luxemburg" [Germany plays with Luxembourg]. Provinciale Zeeuwse Courant (in Dutch). Zeeland. 19 December 1991. Retrieved 3 July 2021.
11. "Liedholm verricht loting" [Liedholm conducts draw]. Provinciale Zeeuwse Courant (in Dutch). Zeeland. 13 January 1992. Retrieved 3 July 2021.
12. "Nederland weer tegen Duitsland" [Netherlands again against Germany]. Provinciale Zeeuwse Courant (in Dutch). Zeeland. 18 January 1992. Retrieved 3 July 2021.
13. "History: Sweden 1-1 France | UEFA EURO 1992".
14. "History: Denmark 0-0 England | UEFA EURO 1992".
15. "History: France 0-0 England | UEFA EURO 1992".
16. "History: Sweden 1-0 Denmark | UEFA EURO 1992".
17. "History: Sweden 2-1 England | UEFA EURO 1992".
18. "History: France 1-2 Denmark | UEFA EURO 1992".
19. "European Football Championship 1992 FINAL". euro2000.org. Union of European Football Associations. Archived from the original on 17 August 2000. Retrieved 26 December 2017.
20. "Season 1992 | UEFA EURO | UEFA.com". Union of European Football Associations. Retrieved 14 May 2020.
21. "1992 team of the tournament". Union of European Football Associations. 17 October 2011. Retrieved 17 June 2012.
22. Kell, Tom (1 February 2013). "The weird and wonderful world of Euro mascots". UEFA.com. Union of European Football Associations. Retrieved 5 April 2015.

External links

• UEFA Euro 1992 at UEFA.com