Europa Conference League 22-23

[prophet:marginal]

Some basics

1. We have to go through a two-legged tie in order to get into the group stages; there are 4 other slots given to a team such as ours (qualifying from the two-legged playoff), from
(a) Spain - tbc
(b) Fiorentina
(c) Koln, and
(d) Nice

Spanish team aside, we have a better coefficient than those others.

2. There are two other routes to the two-legged play-off, either by

(a) earlier qualifying rounds, where teams enter depending on their league's ranking [see below], or by
(b) losing similar Europa League qualifying rounds and dropping down to 'our play off'.

3. Teams already lined up in the 3rd qualifying round, so possibly our opponents include those with higher coefficients than ours, such as

Basel
Slavia Prague
Young Boys, and
PAOK
İstanbul Başakşehir
Maccabi Tel Aviv CC

4. Our coefficient is just over 21.

5. Draw is 01.08.22; first leg 18.08.22

6. This is a good guide to it generally

[funky chicken]

Just make sure the Cole Brothers are back for the live coverage, keep that Owen Hargreaves away, and we should be fine!

[sendô]

No chance of getting Astra Googoo is there?

[bonzosbeard]

Some basics

1. We have to go through a two-legged tie in order to get into the group stages; there are 4 other slots given to a team such as ours (qualifying from the two-legged playoff), from
(a) Spain - tbc
(b) Fiorentina
(c) Koln, and
(d) Nice

Spanish team aside, we have a better coefficient than those others.

2. There are two other routes to the two-legged play-off, either by

(a) earlier qualifying rounds, where teams enter depending on their league's ranking [see below], or by
(b) losing similar Europa League qualifying rounds and dropping down to 'our play off'.

3. Teams already lined up in the 3rd qualifying round, so possibly our opponents include those with higher coefficients than ours, such as

Basel
Slavia Prague
Young Boys, and
PAOK
İstanbul Başakşehir
Maccabi Tel Aviv CC

4. Our coefficient is just over 21.

5. Draw is 01.08.22; first leg 18.08.22

6. This is a good guide to it generally

So basically we cocked up a gilt edged chance to get in Europa and we will be out before its started.

[WCpete]

No chance of getting Astra Googoo is there?

I believe they’ve had back to back relegations.

[Aztec Hammer]

No choice but to dust ourselves down, get over the bitter disappointment of the last few weeks, but then see the positives in another European campaign. A tournament without Arsenal, without CL fallouts and hopefully with minimal financially doped dropouts from the Europa. A tournament that we really should win.

Sign some serious players in order to drop the necessary players to our bench, and go and win the Europa Conference League.

[S-H]

Gives us a proper chance to utilise our squad* whilst blooding a few youngsters in the earlier stages.



*and shiny new players

[WCpete]

It’s not complicated. Just get some ****ing players in. Don’t lose too many. Bring in more than we lose. Otherwise write it off right now.

[HarlowEssexHammer]

It’s not where we wanted to be, but if someone had offered me a run to the semis in the EL and a second year in Europe at the start of the season, I’d have bitten your hand off

[Shabu]

As long as we avoid Young Boys. They have a tasty firm.

[richneal]

Gutted about blowing our chance at the Europa proper, but the conference league is a brilliant competition. Best of the lot by a mile in terms of entertainment and some great matches to watch. Seen a bunch of blinding games this season courtesy of space telly and in terms of watching a great game of football it beats the predictability of Champions league by a country mile.

You'll get third and fourth best teams from some of the larger domestic leagues and a bunch of teams we've never heard of before. Brilliant stuff, and if next year is half as good as this year we're in for a blast.

There's a few other grey hairs on here that will remember the chant at Upton Park in the 70's: "Attack, Attack . . . Attack-Attack- Attack"
That's what the Europa Conference League is.
Wish there were more like it.

[prophet:marginal]

Looks to me like Villareal are the team getting into this from La Liga.

That's some pedigree - both CL and EL semi-finalists participating.

[mumbles87]

Really looking forward to it

European football 2 seasons on the trot .. real progress

Let's get a squad that could cause damage

[Colours never run]

Qualifying for the Europa League like we did last season is great and how it should be done. I just don't see the appeal in this new long winded competition where all it means is only the winner qualifies for the Europa proper as a Clubs reward, but risk losing form/injury/fatigue elsewhere.

Take Leicester this season, they tried to achieve it yet fell short and ultimately lost focus and form in the League where they probably could have qualified next season via the League anyway.

I loved the Europa campaign but this just seems like a red herring sapping a teams energy and resources on it.

I'd rather we focused on the League to qualify in the top 6 again than potentially go through so many games taking our eye off the ball elsewhere. I just don't like the format and think we could suffer from it dragging on.

[Whufc06]

The 4 semi finalists in this were as big if not bigger in European terms than the Europa Leagues

[brownout]

I think we've got more chance of winning the Conference than a domestic cup or a top 6 finish.
I'd like a trophy please.

[Colours never run]

What they should have done, was not f*** about with the prestigious European Cup winners Cup. I'd rather they reinstated that and gave the domestic Cup competitions the respect they deserve by qualifying for it that way than this.

[Aceface]

Take Leicester this season, they tried to achieve it yet fell short and ultimately lost focus and form in the League where they probably could have qualified next season via the League anyway.

Leicester only dropped into the Conference league because they were in terrible form both in the league and in the Europa proper. The Conference wasn’t the reason for their poor form, it was just a visible manifestation of it.

[bubbles1966]

The coefficent required to get in Pot 1 last year was 43,500. There were eight teams with that number or higher. Those teams are essentially in top 40 in Europe overall.

Our coefficient, should we win a play off, would probably make us pot 2/pot 3.

We'd have a 1 in 4 chance of drawing Villareal or Fiorentina in a group.

[il_martello_di_genovesi]

That is not what happened with Leicester. They were in the Europa League to start with. They had a lot of injuries and went on a bad run of form. They then decided the ECL was the best route for them to get into Europe as well as a trophy. Just like we did with the EL.

Winning the ECL would get us into a competition we didn’t qualify for through the league this season.