The gold and silver medals were won by Spain and Great Britain respectively, with the former defeating the latter in the final 3–2. The bronze medal was claimed by Brazil who beat Russia in the deciding match.[6]
Competition schedule
The tournament began on 11 October, one day before the opening ceremony, and ended on the final day of the Games, 16 October.[7]
Matches deciding medal winners took place exclusively on 16 October.[7]
With the exception of UEFA, the six continental zones of FIFA were each originally allocated one berth at the Games.[2] However, neither the Asian Football Confederation (AFC) nor Oceania Football Confederation (OFC) ultimately entered any teams (China were due to enter a team as the AFC representative but withdrew[8]). Therefore, these two vacant berths were redistributed, with CONMEBOL and CONCACAF each receiving one extra berth.
The following teams qualified from their zones via regional preliminary tournaments or invitation (hosts Qatar were eligible to enter a team automatically however declined to enter):[1][3]
a. Competed in qualification as England. England does not have an independent NOC and is instead represented by Great Britain at Olympic events.
b. The dates of teams who qualified via invitation refer to when they were publicly revealed by the qualification organisers.
Venues
Katara Beach, Doha
The matches were held on the Katara Beach[5] at the Beach Soccer Arena which consisted of two venues: the larger-capacity main stadium that hosted the majority of games and located adjacent, a smaller-capacity secondary stadium known as "Pitch 1" for all other matches which was only used during the group stage.[13][14][15]
For the purpose of the draw, the eight teams were split into two pots of four.[17] Two teams from each pot were drawn into each group. Teams from the same confederation could not be drawn into the same group, except for UEFA nations for which one group was permitted to contain two.[17] At the start of the draw, two teams from Pot 1 were automatically allocated to the groups – Spain (European ranking leaders), were assigned to position A1 and Great Britain, (European ranking deputy leaders (as England)), were assigned to position B1.[17][19]
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