Malta women to face Italy, Denmark in Euro qualifiers

The Malta women's national team will face Italy and Denmark in the upcoming 2021 UEFA Women's European Championship qualifications, following the preliminary draw held at the UEFA Headquarters in Nyon, on Thursday.



Led by Mark Gatt, the Maltese side will play in Group B alongside Italy (Pot 1), Denmark (Pot 2), Bosnia-Herzegovina (Pot 3), Israel (Pot 4) and Georgia (Pot 5).
This will be the first time that Malta and Italy will cross swords in a qualifier while the Denmark already faced Malta in the 2015 FIFA Women's World Cup qualifications.
Moreover, the Danes were finalists in the previous European Championship where they lost 4-2 at the hands of the hosts Netherlands. 
Meanwhile, Malta already faced the three other teams in previous competitions - Bosnia in the 2005 Women's Euro qualifiers, Israel in the 2015 Women's World Cup preliminaries and in the 2017 European qualifiers they had defeated Georgia 2-1. 
Qualification format

The group winners and the three runners-up with the best record against the sides first, third, fourth and fifth in their sections will join hosts England in the final tournament.
The other six runners-up will play off in October 2020 for the...