Russia will host the 2013 European Mixed Team Badminton Championships, the country’s badminton authorities said Tuesday.
The tournament will take place in the town of Ramenskoye, 25 kilometers outside Moscow, from February 12-17 next year, a statement on the Russian National Badminton Federation’s website said.
During the the Soviet era, Moscow hosted the 1980 Olympic badminton event and the 1990 European championships, but Russia has never held a major tournament.
Winning the right to host the championships was the culmination of years of effort, RNBF president Andrei Antropov said.
“We’ve been heading towards this contract for long enough,” he said in a statement’s on the federation’s website.
“To receive the European championships we had to demonstrate a high standard of hosting international competitions over a number of years, to get positive ratings for them and actively integrate into the European badminton process.”
Russia has reached the semifinals at the last two mixed team championships, in Liverpool in 2009 and Amsterdam in 2011, winning bronze.
