Ireland and Czechia join GB as final World Games 2025 places secured

Ireland and Czechia secured their places at The World Games 2025 with semi-final wins at the 2025 EuroLax Sixes Cup in Vila Real de Santo António, Portugal over the weekend.

With USA, Canada, Australia, and Great Britain having already qualified for the Games by finishing in the top four at the 2022 competition, China qualifying as hosts, and Japan as the Pan-Asia regional qualifiers, there were just two spots up for grabs as 12 European teams came together for the EuroLax Sixes Cup.

And after six days of competition, Ireland confirmed their place at August’s World Games by defeating Israel in an over-time thriller that finished 11-10 while Czechia booked their spot with a huge 15-5 win over Germany.

Ireland claimed the 2025 EuroLax trophy with a tight 12-11 win against Czechia but the big prize was already won with both teams heading Chengdu, China to take part in The World Games from 7-11 August.

Czechia will make their second appearance at The World Games after competing in the sixes competition in 2022 in Birmingham, Alabama.

Ireland will make their debut in the event after a strong year for its various women’s teams, participating in the European Women’s Lacrosse Championship, the World Lacrosse Women’s U20 Championship and the World Lacrosse Women’s Box Championship.

Great Britain will feature in the competition for the third time after finishing fourth in both 2017 and 2022.

For more information about The World Games 2025, click HERE.

World Games 2022 Schedule Revealed

The full schedule has been released for next year’s The World Games, taking place in Birmingham, Alabama, USA.

There will be 34 sports taking part at next year’s 11th edition of the Games across six different categories: Artistic & Dance Sport, Ball Sports, Martial Arts, Precision Sports, Strength Sports, and Trend Sports.

Lacrosse will be in the Ball Sports category and both women’s and men’s six-a-side versions of the game will be featured.

This comes after women’s lacrosse made its World Games debut at the 2017 edition of the competition.

At that Games, Great Britain women finished fourth behind winners USA, runners-up Canada, and bronze medal winners Australia.

Men’s lacrosse will make its World Games debut next year, initially taking part as an invitational sport.

The World Games was first staged in 1981 and is meant to highlight those sports that do not compete at the Olympic Games.

Many sports, such as badminton, beach volleyball, and triathlon have all been World Games events but have since been allowed to take part in the Olympic Games and so no longer compete.

The 2022 Games are due to start on 7 July and will run for ten days until 17 July with the men’s lacrosse competition running from 8 to 12 July and the women’s tournament from 12 to 16 July.

Check out the full lacrosse schedule HERE and the whole World Games 2022 schedule HERE.