Bosnia and Herzegovina national cadet football team gathered yesterday at the training camp in Zenica where they will stay and prepare for the UEFA European Under-17 Championship.

Assistant coach in our U-17 team Damjan Ratkovic talks about the Europe's biggest festival of football:

"It's a very significant achievement for us. Even though BiH is a small country, we've made to the European Championship for the second time in a row. When we look at the teams have failed to qualify for the final tournament, then this effort becomes even more important. In this respect, these guys must really be congratulated for everything they have done so far.

We know what awaits us at the European Championship. The experience we gained last year will certainly be useful now. We're facing challenging matches, but we're going to analyze the opponents and try to prepare our players as best as we can. Players are standards in their clubs, they play continuously and they are in good shape. Physically they are ready for the upcoming challenges.

There are no easy opponents at the major competitions. The first game with Germany will probably be the most challenging and perhaps it's good to get it out of the way at the very start. Last year we won three points at the European Championship, and hopefully this year we can make a step forward and reach the the quarter-finals."