Eleven Teams to Face Off in Abu Dhabi

you're listening to an article from horse sport.com. eleven teams to face off in abu dhabi by: fei communications |. following the immense success of the inaugural series of the longines league of nations™ 2024, it returns under the same format for 2025 and promises to deliver top class sport as the world’s top ten jumping nations battle for supremacy across three continents. as in 2024, the 2025 longines league of nations™ series gets underway in abu dhabi (uae) at the impressive al forsan international sports resort on 15 february 2025. ireland, france, usa, great britain, germany, belgium, switzerland, netherlands, sweden and italy have all gained eligibility to participate in the 2025 edition of the longines league of nations™ as the top ten ranked nations in the world. as winners of the final last season, germany had officially qualified regardless of their ranking. these ten qualified teams are joined in abu dhabi by the host nation, united arab emirates. the series is comprised of four qualifying events each with a prize fund of €700,000 and culminates with the final in barcelona (esp) in october where €1,600,000 in prize money alongside lucrative bonus prizes are set to lure the ‘crème de la crème’ of jumping’s elite once more. from abu dhabi, the series jets across the atlantic to ocala (usa) in march, back across to europe to rotterdam (ned) in june before st-tropez gassin (fra) plays host for the first time and becomes venue for the final qualifying leg in september. the series concludes once again in barcelona for the second edition of the longines league of nations™ final where one team will be crowned the winner. rankings for the longines league of nations™. the longines league of nations™ is open to ten teams. the winning team from the previous season’s final gains automatic qualification, whist the remaining nine places are open to the nine highest ranked jumping nations in the world (disregarding the nation that is already qualified). for 2025, the ranking list that decided those ten teams was the longines league of nations™ ranking- no 14, which included results up to 31 october 2024. points accumulated by the six top athletes from each nation, including one u25, are combined to give each nation their total. it is this that decides a nations’ ranking from which the top ten teams are eligible to compete in the longines league of nations™. longines league of nations™ format. the longines league of nations™ 2025 series will follow the same format as 2024, differing slightly from that of traditional nations cups. the competition is comprised of two full rounds of jumping over the same course. all teams send out four athletes in round one with the best three scores counting for the team total. the best eight teams return for round two, where they no longer have the luxury of a discard score as only three athletes from each team may jump again and every score counts. after two rounds, the team with the lowest combined score (the least faults) will be the winner. in the event of a tie on penalties for first place after the second round, there will be a jump-off between the tying nations with just one athlete from each of those teams contesting the jump-off. there will be no jump-off for any placings beyond this. in the event of a tie for lower placings the combined time of the three athletes in the second round will determine the final standings. the teams for the longines league of nations™ in abu dhabi. ireland’s chef d’equipe michael blake has named his team for abu dhabi as longines league of nations™ newcomers trevor breen and jason foley, alongside denis lynch and michael pender. france sends out kevin staut, simon delestre, jeanne sadran and alexa ferrer. usa will be represented by an all-female quartet of lucy davis kennedy, kaitlin campbell, taylor kain and skylar wireman lead by chef d’equipe robert ridland. otto becker has put his faith in katrin eckermann, sophie hinners, jörne sprehe and maximilian weishaupt to spearhead the 2025 campaign for the reining longines league of nations™ champions, germany. di lampard’s paris olympic team gold medallists great britain are represented by tim gredley, joseph stockdale, donald whitaker and robert murphy, whilst peter weinberg relies upon rik hemeryck, thibeau spits, jos verlooy and wilm vermeir to get belgium off to a flying start. young chef d’equipe peter van der waaij has selected team gold medallist of the fei jumping european championship 2021 in riesenbeck (ger), bryan balsiger alongside romain duguet, janika sprunger and edouard schmitz to open switzerland’s campaign. under their new chef d’equipe wout-jan van der schans, runners-up in the longines league of nations™ final 2024, netherlands call upon kevin jochems, tani joosten, leopold van asten and jur vrieling to get their 2025 season off to a strong start. henrik ankarcrona’s reigning world and european champions sweden will be pinning their hopes on rolf-göran bengtsson, angelie von essen, angelica augustsson zanotelli and petronella andersson to build on their podium finish in the inaugural longines league of nations™ final 2024 in barcelona. making their debut appearance in the longines league of nations™, piergiorgio bucci, emanuele camilli, giacomo casadei and giulia martinengo marquet will fly the flag for italy whilst abdullah mohd al marri, omar abdul aziz al marzooqi, abdullah humaid al muhairi and humaid abdulla khalifa al muhairi will represent the host nation uae. the action gets underway in abu dhabi from february 11 to 15, 2025 with the opening leg of the longines league of nations™ being held on february 15 at the al forsan international sports resort.