How race for 5th Champions League spot looks with Premier League at risk of missing out after Man Utd and Newcastle woes
THE Champions League is set for a major revamp that will see two major European nations be handed an extra spot in the competition from next season.
As it stands, the Premier League would miss out on gaining a fifth place.
The Champions League has long featured 32 teams split into eight groups of four, with the top two advancing out of each.
From next year it will be moving to the Swiss Model.
This will instead see 36 teams admitted into one big league table with the top eight qualifying automatically for the round of 16 and positions 9-24 contesting a play-off.
To determine fixtures teams will be split into four pots of nine.
Each club will be drawn to face two teams from each pot, including their own.
No teams will drop into the Europa League following the conclusion of the group stage.
With the number of teams admitted into the Champions League growing from 32 to 36, four extra spots will be up for grabs.
Two of these spots will go to the leagues whose clubs perform best in European competitions, including the Europa League and Europa Conference League, this season.
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While the further two will go to the team that comes third in the Uefa nation ranked fifth in coefficient, and the other going to the champions’ qualifying path.
The best performing leagues will be determined by the average coefficient of clubs participating in Europe.
Every win by a club from a nation is worth two points, a draw one and a defeat none.
Bonus points are then accrued by progressing through various stages of each competition.
Playing in the Champions League group stage is worth four points, with five dished out for qualifying for the round of 16 and one each for the quarter-finals, semis and final.
Winning a Europa League group, as Liverpool already have done, is worth four points, while two are given to runners up.
Bonus points are then handed out for reaching the round of 16, quarters, semis and final.
Winning your group in the Europa Conference League, as Aston Villa could, is worth two points, while qualifying as runner-up is worth one.
Bonus points are given for reaching the semis or final.
All points earned by clubs from each country are added up before being divided by the number of teams from that nation in Europe, eight in the Premier League’s case.
Manchester United and Newcastle‘s failure to progress, even into the Europa League, has seen the Premier League’s coefficient drop to third as it stands.
The English top flight would have been awarded the extra Champions League spot in four of the last five seasons, the exception being 2019-20.
Currently its coefficient number, 12.13, is behind those of Germany, 13.36, and Italy, 13.14.
With Man Utd and Newcastle both out already, the Prem will be heavily reliant on its other clubs to have deep runs in order to accumulate enough points to climb into the top two.
Holders Manchester City have won their Champions League group, while Arsenal have too.
Liverpool, Brighton and West Ham have all progressed in the Europa League, and Aston Villa have qualified for the Europa Conference League knockout rounds.
As it stands, the Bundesliga and Serie A would be handed the extra Champions League places.
Should a team from one of the two nations with the highest coefficient win the Europa League without finishing in the top five of their own division, that country could have six teams in the Champions League.
