UEFA will be debuting a new European club competition next season. The UEFA Europa Conference League has been created to give smaller teams or those from nations lower down the Associate rankings more opportunities and a better chance.
The competition will be contested by 184 teams from the 55 UEFA member associations. 138 teams will initially qualify through league position or winning a domestic cup. The remaining 46 teams will come from sides eliminated from the Champions League and Europa League.
How many teams qualify?
• 1 team from Associations 1-5
• 2 teams from Associations 6-15 and 51-55
• 3 teams from Associations 16-50
• 1 team from Liechtenstein, as they don't have a domestic league, only the cup winners qualify.
How does the tournament work?
The qualifying phase is split into four rounds. 70 teams go into the first round. Teams entering at this stage are the 24 cup winners from associations 32-55, 25 domestic league runners-up from associations 30-55 (excluding Liechtenstein) and 21 domestic third-place teams from associations 29-50 (excluding Liechtenstein). The 35 winners of the two-legged ties will progress into the second round.
In the second round the tournament splits into two, the Champions path and main path. The Champions path will be for teams that are eliminated from the Champions League and Europa League. The main path involves teams that originally qualified for the ECL. The Champions Path contains the 20 teams eliminated from the Preliminary and First Qualifying rounds of the Champions League. The 35 teams are joined by 55 more teams in the main path. These are the domestic cup winners from associations 16-31, the 14 domestic runners-up from associations 16-29, 15 domestic third-place teams from associations 14-28, 9 domestic fourth-placed teams from associations 7-15 and the fifth-place team from Portugal.
Only seven new teams enter at the third-qualifying round. 7 domestic third-place teams from associations 7-13. 26 Main Path teams and 5 Champions Path teams advance to the Playoff Round.
The 5 Champions Path teams are joined the 5 teams eliminated from the Europa League third qualifying round Champions Path. 8 teams join the main path. The fourth-place team from Portugal, the fifth-place team for France, 4 domestic sixth-placed teams from associations 1,3 and 4, the EFL Cup winners from England, and the 2 teams eliminated from the Europa League qualifying third round main path.
The 32 team group stage is made up of the 17 winners of the Main Path, the 5 winners from the Champions Path and the 10 teams that lost the Europa League Play-off round. The group stage works in the same way as the UCL and UEL, 8 groups of four teams, playing each other team home and away, with the top two advancing.
New for UEFA competitions this season is the preliminary knockout round, the eight group runners-up and the eight teams who came third in their Europa League group face off to contest the last eight spots for the knockout phase, joining the eight group winners. From their it is the standard knock-out format, leading to the final on the 28th May 2022 at the Arena Kombetare in Tirana, Albania.
All qualifying round ties and knockout ties will be played in two legs, with each team playing home and away, although there could some ties that get played in neutral arenas depending on COVID restrictions in countries.
Another impact of COVID-19 is some countries have cancelled their domestic cup (Faroe Islands, Finland, Iceland, Kazakhstan, Luxembourg and Norway). This means for the 2021-22 season, the fourth placed team for Finland, Iceland, Kazakhstan, Luxembourg and Norway will take the place, and the third place team in the Faroe Islands.
How does it affect Scottish teams?
Two teams qualify for the Europa Conference League. The third and fourth place team in the Scottish Premiership, however if either Celtic or Rangers win the Scottish Cup, which is highly likely, third place will get the Europa League place, and fifth place will then get the ECL place. Rangers and the cup winner/third place team are both guaranteed group stage football in this competition as a worst case scenario. This means a non-old firm team will participate in Group Stage European football since Hearts were in the 2004-05 UEFA Cup group stage.
I think the competition is a good idea, giving smaller teams a chance to shine on the big stage. However, with these smaller teams playing will it get a high enough TV audience for UEFA to extend it past the three year trial period, especially when they are playing games on the same day and the same time as Europa League games?
Fans on twitter have also been voicing their opinion, thinking that teams can be knocked out of two competitions but still stay in Europe thinking that it diminishes the integrity and lower the standard of competition, for tournaments that we think or are led to believe have the best of the best competing in them.
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