| Tourney Name: | Euro Winners Cup |
| Year: | 2022 |
| Size: | 175px |
| Country: | Portugal |
| Dates: | 3–12 June |
| Num Teams: | 60 |
| Confederations: | 1 |
| Venues: | 3 |
| Cities: | 1 |
| Count: | 1 |
| Second Other: | Braga |
| Third Other: |  Kfar Qassem |
| Fourth Other: |  GM Pyramide |
| Matches: | 154 |
| Goals: | 1150 |
| Prevseason: | 2021 |
| Nextseason: | 2023 |
The 2022 Euro Winners Cup was the tenth edition of the Euro Winners Cup (EWC), an annual continental beach soccer tournament for men's top-division European clubs. The championship is the sport's version of the better known UEFA Champions League in association football.[1]
Organised by Beach Soccer Worldwide (BSWW), the tournament was held in Nazaré, Portugal from 3–12 June.[2]
The event began with a qualification round. The competition proper then commenced, with a round robin group stage. At its conclusion, the best teams progressed to the knockout stage, a series of single elimination games to determine the winners, starting with the round of 16 and ending with the final. Consolation matches were also played to determine other final rankings.
Kristall of Russia were the defending champions but were barred from entering the competition this year. The final was contended between two Portuguese clubs, Benfica Loures and Braga; the former won the competition for the first time, whilst the latter finished as runners-up for the third year straight.[3]
Normal qualification rules returned, having been suspended for the last two editions, due to the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic in Europe.[4] [5]
The number of clubs which are entitled to enter automatically from each country depends on the perceived strength of their country's national league. BSWW determine the strength of each league by analysing the performance of all clubs in the EWC on a country-by-country basis over the previous five editions. A points-based ranking is produced from the data, as seen in the table below.[6] [7]
From the most recent edition of their country's national league:
The above clubs take priority and are offered their country's slots first. However, if such clubs choose not to are or unable to participate, the slot is offered to the next highest placed teams from their league in turn until one accepts. Thus, in reality, some countries fill their allocated quota with clubs placed considerably lower down in their league, don't fill all their slots, or sometimes fill no slots at all.
The "host club" and defending champions also enter automatically.[8]
Any and all clubs that don't qualify automatically, and/or are surplus to their countries allocated quotas, are entitled to enter the accompanying Euro Winners Challenge (preliminary round) to take place in the days prior to the competition proper, as a last opportunity to qualify for the EWC group stage; the best eight clubs will qualify.[9]
| A further 27 members of UEFA are unranked; all are entitled to enter one club. | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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60 clubs from 22 different nations entered the event – 32 entered straight into the group stage, 28 entered into the preliminary round.[13]
La Louvière of Belgium originally entered but were subsequently replaced by Benfica Viseu of Portugal.
Key: H: Hosts \ TH: Title holders
| Group stage | |||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| (4) | ACD O Sótão | (2) | Newteam Brussels | (1) | West Deva | ||
| Benfica Loures | BLC Vamos | (1) | Slavia Prague | ||||
| Braga | (2) | Grande-Motte Pyramide | (1) | Portsmouth | |||
| Sporting CP | Marseille BT | (1) | Augur Enemat | ||||
| (3) | Huelva | (1) | Boca Gdańsk | (1) | Baggio | ||
| Levante | (1) | Alanya Belediyespor | (1) | Arman Pablodar | |||
| Melistar | (1) | Atlas AO | (1) | Dembava | |||
| (3) | Bavaria Bazis | (1) | Kfar Qassem | (1) | Husty | ||
| Beach Royals Düsseldorf | (1) | Spartak Varna | |||||
| Rostocker Robben | (1) | Nistru Chișinău | |||||
| (2) | Naxos | (1) | Copenhagen | ||||
| Pisa 2014 | (1) | Bemannia Stockholm | |||||
| Euro Winners Challenge (preliminary round) | |||||||
| (16) | ACD O Sótão B | (16) | Nazarenos | (2) | Marseille Minots | ||
| Alfarim | Porto Mendo | Toulon | |||||
| Belenenses | São Domingos | (2) | AO Kefallinia | ||||
| Benfica Caldas Rainha | Sesimbra | Napoli Patron | |||||
| Benfica Loures B | Varzim | (1) | Real Münster | ||||
| Benfica Viseu | Vilaflor | (1) | Rosh HaAyin | ||||
| Buarcos 2017 | (4) | ES Brainoise | (1) | Djoker Chişinău | |||
| Chaves | Genappe | (1) | Zlaté Moravce | ||||
| GRAP | Newteam RCSB | ||||||
| Nazaré 2022 | Perwez | ||||||
The draw to split the clubs 32 and 28 clubs into groups for both the group and preliminary stages respectively took place at 12:00 CEST (UTC+2) on 6 May at BSWW's headquarters in Barcelona, Spain.[14]
The designation of "home" and "away" teams displayed in the results matrices is for administrative purposes only.
Matches took place from 3 to 5 June.
The group winners, plus the best runner-up, qualified to the competition proper.
