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European Conference League, 2021-2022

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    European Conference League, 2021-2022

    We are only five weeks away from the draw for the first and second qualifying rounds (15-16 June). This is the format and UEFA's rationale:

    https://www.uefa.com/uefaeuropaconfe...eague-lowdown/

    Seeded and unseeded teams for the various rounds and paths:

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2021%E...alifying_round

    The biggest team that's likely to be in it will, I assume, be the 7th placed club from one of the big 4 leagues, currently Spurs, Moenchengladbach, Roma, Villareal, although they all have to get through a play-off round. Marseille and Pacos de Ferreira are also positioned to join from France and Portugal.

    #2
    Absolute shambles of a tournament and only UEFA could come up with such a monstrosity. Clubs dropping down from EL at the final qualifying stage and even more dropping down from EL straight in to the group stage. The clubs listed aren’t huge, but they are giants resource-wise compared to my team, Aberdeen who come in at the second qualifying stage. The tournament was allegedly for clubs from the so called smaller nations which in a way is true. There’s tons of smaller clubs especially in the earlier stages and their award for getting through those earl6 rounds is to then get knocked out before the group stage by the likes of Spurs, Roma, Villarreal etc. shambles!

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      #3
      Actually we're all hoping that Villareal qualify for the Champions League...

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        #4
        Liverpool v Aberdeen would be fun. 40th anniversary.

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          #5
          Originally posted by Rogin the Armchair fan View Post
          Liverpool v Aberdeen would be fun. 40th anniversary.
          I’d prefer if it wasn’t. It would be very one sided, a bit like a group of dads playing against the under 5’s and the dads playing like it was the World Cup final.

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            #6
            UEFA's spin in the link in the OP is that, due to the Champions Paths, there will be a minimum of 31 and maximum of 37 domestic champions who qualify across the group stages of the three competitions. That's probably how they've got the mid-ranking nations on board (your champs have at least a 50-50 chance of being in a group). The problem with this is that they're not going to get near a knockout round game because there will be bigger and far wealthier teams from the top 10 leagues in the way.

            The other problem is that it makes those smaller leagues uncompetitive due to being skewed by the European revenue. We have already seen this in how even a qualifying round run can skew the Welsh league. Imagine a club from a mid-ranking league getting six TV games, all of which they lose but accruing revenue that guarantees they are top dogs at home for years.

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              #7
              Originally posted by Satchmo Distel View Post
              UEFA's spin in the link in the OP is that, due to the Champions Paths, there will be a minimum of 31 and maximum of 37 domestic champions who qualify across the group stages of the three competitions. That's probably how they've got the mid-ranking nations on board (your champs have at least a 50-50 chance of being in a group). The problem with this is that they're not going to get near a knockout round game because there will be bigger and far wealthier teams from the top 10 leagues in the way.

              The other problem is that it makes those smaller leagues uncompetitive due to being skewed by the European revenue. We have already seen this in how even a qualifying round run can skew the Welsh league. Imagine a club from a mid-ranking league getting six TV games, all of which they lose but accruing revenue that guarantees they are top dogs at home for years.
              Totally agree Satch with both points. Regarding the latter, a few years ago, Celtic qualified for CL group stage. Won 1 game out of 6 but managed to finish third in group and thus parachuted into latter stages of EL. Did nothing much there. At the end of the season got €40m or so reward for their “success”. Meanwhile the rest of the Scottish league is surviving on pennies. A highly uncompetitive league, becomes an incredibly more uncompetitive league. It’s happening all across the European leagues. Thanks UEFA.

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                #8
                UEFA will presumably have to inject some cash into this competition to make it worthwhile for a club like Spurs to make an effort. But that cash requires TV companies to be interested in group games between sides that might be unknown in the big TV markets. Obviously, they've thrown in teams from the big 4 leagues in the expectation that the markets would pay for their games, even though you'd expect, say, Spurs, to field their 'B' teams or kids, and there's a risk that an 'unfashionable' EPL team would get the place.

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                  #9
                  Given that the Champions League KO stage is a last 16 and EL one a last 32, is the Conference League a battle for 49th place (and the EL a battle for 17th place)? Or do you factor in the sides that get eliminated from the two bigger tournaments without being parachuted into a play-off?

                  (I know this is academic stuff given that the 8th placed teams in England and Spain would fancy their chances of getting through an EL group, but I am just playing around with the idea that these are real tiers rather than fabricated cups with allocations based on politics. Are Villareal and Man U 17th or 18th for 2020-21 or do you say that they have equivalent strength to the weakest losers in the CL last 16?)
                  Last edited by Satchmo Distel; 26-05-2021, 22:44.

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                    #10
                    Villareal have already provided one of the quirks of this competition - they qualified for it on Saturday, then last night won the Europa League and in so doing took themselves not only into next year's Champions League instead, but into the top pot of seeds for it. I think that means Spain won't have anyone in the Conference (as they will have 5 in the CL instead).
                    Last edited by Rogin the Armchair fan; 27-05-2021, 06:28.

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                      #11
                      That's right.

                      No Spanish club in the inaugural version of this competition.

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                        #12
                        Originally posted by ursus arctos View Post
                        That's right.

                        No Spanish club in the inaugural version of this competition.
                        Unless Betis or Sociedad finish third in their Europa League groups.

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                          #13
                          I knew there was a catch

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                            #14
                            The first final is set to be played in Tirana in a 21000-capacity stadium. At least this is a tournament where many smaller countries will have the ability to host the final. Hopefully it will be held in Oslo sometime in the future.

                            My club, Valerenga, qualifed for this year and enters unseeded in the 2nd round. There are quite a few of the seeded teams I fancy pour chances against, such as for example Suduva, Dundalk or Apollon Limmassol. In the event that we should progress to the latter qualifying rounds and draw one of the clubs from the bigger nations, I hope we will get Union Berlin. This is the first time this side of the Berlin Wall that they have qualified for Europe and it might possibly be a bit of deal for them. For Tottenham and Roma this tournament is most likely just a complete drag.
                            Last edited by Belhaven; 27-05-2021, 07:39.

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                              #15
                              I can assure you that it is an absolutely massive deal for Union, even though it is likely they will have to play in the Olympiastadion

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                                #16
                                I know this competition looks like a dog's breakfast after the dog has thrown it back up, but there's also a certain democratic logic behind its existence in that it gives teams from weak leagues the chance to compete in European competition beyond July and August. Wales, Iceland, Scottish teams that aren't Celtic or Rangers etc. It's a shame they're persisting with the tedious group phase, or that they didn't just bring back the European Cup Winners' Cup with a straight knockout format, but not everyone wants to take European football back to the 1970s like me.

                                The third-placed teams dropping into the competition below is also infuriating, but then even that makes a certain sense in trying to avoid dead rubber group games. But not as much sense as abolishing group games altogether and making all three competitions into straight knockout contests.

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                                  #17
                                  No Spanish club in the inaugural version of this competition.
                                  If Spurs had won the EL, would there have been no EPL team in this one? If so I could imagine a future in which a 7th placed club from England and/or Spain gets elevated into one of the top two competitions each season. I don't think UEFA had thought that one through marketing-wise and we might see them modifying future competitions to allow the 8th team in (e.g. Arsenal)

                                  "The third-placed teams dropping into the competition below" also relates to a recent topic I raised: predicting the next club to win a European trophy for the first time. As Ursus replied, you may have been able to predict that if you knew the runners and riders in August but this format forces you to factor in all kinds of parachuting scenarios.
                                  Last edited by Satchmo Distel; 27-05-2021, 08:58.

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                                    #18
                                    The conference league is just like the first couple of years of the champions league in the mid '90s, they farmed off the "less glamourous / pointless / cannon fodder" nations into a lesser competition back then as well.

                                    I saw that one of the rationales behind the competition was to give "less glamourous / pointless / cannon fodder" nations more of a chance of "European Glory" yet it's still difficult for the clubs of those nations to get anywhere in the competition. Not only are there four qualifying rounds before the group stage but they'll also be adding lucky losers from the more elite competitions to three of the qualifying rounds.

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                                      #19
                                      One quirk of the rejigged European competitions is that the Europa League now officially starts with the Third Qualifying Round. The First and Second Qualifying rounds of the Champions League effectively fill the role for both competitions, with the Second Qualifying Round determining whether you continue in the CL or drop into the EL (losers in the first qualifying round drop directly to the Conference League)

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                                        #20
                                        Originally posted by Kowalski View Post
                                        The conference league is just like the first couple of years of the champions league in the mid '90s, they farmed off the "less glamourous / pointless / cannon fodder" nations into a lesser competition back then as well.

                                        I saw that one of the rationales behind the competition was to give "less glamourous / pointless / cannon fodder" nations more of a chance of "European Glory" yet it's still difficult for the clubs of those nations to get anywhere in the competition. Not only are there four qualifying rounds before the group stage but they'll also be adding lucky losers from the more elite competitions to three of the qualifying rounds.
                                        Also add in the seeded ‘ unseeded aspect of the draw, it makes it even more difficult for the teams from “less glamourous / pointless / cannon fodder" nations to progress.

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                                          #21
                                          There should be a minimum of 31 national champions across the three group stages, which is about a third of all slots, but I think the seeding is on club coefficients, which for most of them will be very low. Spurs, with no domestic title for 60 years and likely to field their kids, presumably seed highest.

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                                            #22
                                            The use of coefficients to seed the pots in the big one is going to add a bit of unexpected spice next year for once - Milan will be in pot four, having only had this year's Europa League run in five seasons. You could end up with a first stage group of Bayern, Man United, Porto and Milan.

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                                              #23
                                              Patently the entrance of losing teams from other competitions to this (and the Europe League) is fucking stupid, and should never be happening

                                              But I think the idea that teams enter these competitions to win them and if they cannot win them then it is pointless is a false one. The vast majority of teams who are in this will be happy to be in it to have the promise of glory (even if "glory" in this context means getting through the second qualifying round) on a wider stage. Bar a very few, teams don't enter the FA Cup thinking they're going to win it, but that doesn't lessen the nature of the early stages.
                                              Last edited by ad hoc; 28-05-2021, 10:38.

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                                                #24
                                                I'd be absolutely delighted to have a campaign in the Conference League. I get the feeling that our new Board feel the same way, unlike the last lot.

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                                                  #25
                                                  They should bar the ESL clubs from all UEFA competitions completely of course but if they compete at all it should only by qualifying for the CL, with no parachute into the Europa League and no qualification via the FA Cup, League Cup or 5th to 7th places. Only non-ESLs should be eligible for those slots. Every club that finished below Spurs and Arsenal has a greater moral right to be in the Conference League and would surely appreciate it far more.

                                                  For example, Man U have stunk out the Europa League twice and should not have a 3rd crack. I can't recall any joy the ESL clubs have brought to the Europa League except the pleasure of seeing them get beaten.
                                                  Last edited by Satchmo Distel; 28-05-2021, 11:10.

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