2 replies to this topic

[PaulBand]

As many will know, European coefficients & Scottish teams in Europe is my kind of forte.

Unfortunately, most of our teams are out by early August which leaves me sacked for almost a whole season.

I was looking at what lay ahead for Scottish teams next season and I thought I'd try and explain.

Next season, Scottish teams are allocated 1 champions league place, and 3 Europa league places
The SPL champions from 11/12 play in the qualifying rounds of the Champions League
2nd & 3rd in the SPL qualify for the Europa League qualifiers

The winners of the Scottish Cup also qualify for the Europa League qualifiers UNLESS they have already qualified for European competition
IN WHICH CASE
The runnes up will qualify UNLESS they have also already qualified
IN WHICH CASE
4th place in the SPL will qualify

I'm guessing most people understand that part already.


- The Scottish league system is ranked 18th best in Europe (out of a possible 53 & purely based on results of teams participating in Europe in the last 5 years)

- 07/08 coefficients will become invalid next season. This was the season Rangers got to the Europa league final & Celtic were in the last 16 of the champions league.

Take away our coefficient for that season & we drop behind Norway, Bulgaria, Sloakia & even Belarus!

Obviously we cannot expect the same success that season brought, but we NEED a successful season.


On a positive note, we will not lose any of our European places if we have another shocker.
A good season will keep us where we are, there isn't much hope of going forward for the next few seasons at least.

If Rangers are not out of administration by the end of March, they are ineligible to play in Europe.
Rangers are also 47th in the club coefficient, which obviously means only 46 European clubs are outperforming them currently.
For the record Celtic are 65th.

Should Rangers especially lose their club coefficient then they may be listed as an unseeded team in the future, meaning that they will have a generally harder tie.

Celtic should be ok, as long as they qualify for the group stages of a competition & get a few results along the way.

the 2 other Scottish teams that qualify probably have no realistic chance of reaching the group stages of a competition, but getting through 1 or even 2 qualifying rounds will be massively beneficial to both them and the country in the future, as well as the clubs own financial gain along the way.

Knowing this, I reckon Scotland will need 5 years to regain 2 champions league places - which is what we are aiming for.

What I have explained is only the basic outline, but next season is the biggest in terms of Europe for Scottish football since the champions league was introduced.

[Laurie]

I thought that we had a second Champions League place back for this season, as it runs on a 5 year cycle...?

[PaulBand]

 Laurie, on 14 February 2012 - 08:48 PM, said:

I thought that we had a second Champions League place back for this season, as it runs on a 5 year cycle...?

Sorry Laurie, we do.
but next season is the last season of that 5 year cycle.

What I failed to mention is that the format for our teams that qualify is correct but from 2013/14 onwards.

What our clubs need to do in terms of performance still remains the same, or we will have to play against tougher teams and/or more qualifying rounds.