No English team has ever won this competition before so an opportunity for Spurs to be the pride of England next May when this is in the trophy cabinet. The draw for the first two qualifying rounds happen on Tuesday and Wednesday. Irish and Welsh clubs enter the first qualifying round. Scots enter the second qualifying round. Great opportunity for some smaller nations to get a taste of group stage football. Hoping for some 'upsets' and some really obscure teams in the groups
Tbh I don't give a shit about this new competition. I mean, UEFA cancelled the old European Cup Winners Cup in the mid90's and now they're installing a third "competition" again. Another shit idea from UEFA. They had so many of it in the past like 3rd placed teams in Champions League groups qualify for the knockout round of Europa League or 24 teams in the Euro where after the group stage only 1/3 of the countries are eliminated and 66% qualify for the knockout rounds. What comes next? All 24 countries qualify for the knockout rounds after the group stage? How about a European Cup only for 2nd tier clubs (maybe the only chance for HSV in my lifetime to win an European Cup again ) ? Anyway, I'll boycott this new competition (not that it matters ).
Money talks I guess but another set of players who will probably suffer burn out from this competition. Can see loads of teams playing the reserves.
I agree it's a bit much but I'm going to embrace it whilst we're in it. First qualifying round done today. Unfortunately a few British match-ups already so some will be crashing out pretty early. Ties of British / Irish interest. FH Hafnarfjordur v Sligo Rovers St Jarnan v Bohemian FC Glentoran v The New Saints FK Velez v Coleraine FC Bala Town v Larne FC Dundalk v Newtown AFC Aberdeen & Hibs enter in qualifying round 2 with the draw done tomorrow.
CL dropouts and 1st round winners sorted so round 2 is as below (Brits / Irish only) Shamrock Rovers v Bye (odd number of teams so easy passage to the next round). Linfield v Borac Banja Luka Prishtina v Connah's Quay Nomads Dundalk v FCI Levadia Kauno Zalgiris v The New Saints Hibernian v FC Santa Coloma Larne v AGF F91 Dudelange v Bohemians Aberdeen v BK Hacken Third round draw on Monday, Spurs enter in the fourth and final round of qualifying.
I thought the format would give Welsh clubs a decent chance of getting to the group stage, but looking through it's going to be very difficult for TNS through the main path with all the seedings to quality. Two decent draws for TNS and Cei Connah though in the second round, both in with a decent chance of making the third round which would generally be considered progress. I believe in recent history League of Wales clubs have only got to the third qualifying round of European competitions three times: Bangor City 3QF Europa League 2011, TNS PO Europa League 2011 & TNS 3QF Europa League 2020.
It's nice that it does give nations such as yourselves some hope of group football. It's still asking a lot of some of these teams to win 3 / 4 games to qualify though. You've got to hope for a bit of luck in the draws really. I think round 3 is achievable for many of the above but I can't see many of them going much beyond that - particularly as they'll be unseeded in Monday's draw.
I don't think there's much chance of any of them qualifying through the main draw, Rennes aren't even seeded at the moment for that draw and looking at it the weakest side you'd probably get would be AEK Athens which our sides just won't compete with over two legs. The Champions looks a little bit more doable though. You'd think that Shamrock Rovers would be in a good position to potentially qualify through that means as well, I know they've qualified for the group stage before but it'd be a big deal if they (or the winners of the League of Ireland) were to regularly get group stage football which would be worth £3 million plus a season.
Alright, second qualifying round is over. There were a few 'scalps' if you want to call them that given the level of football we're talking about. That said, I consider them all names to a degree with European experience. Steaua Bucharest, AEK Athens, BATE, Hadjuk Split and Maribor all crashed out tonight. There were a few other scares. Cska Sofia, Aberdeen, Lokomotiv Plovdiv, Feyenoord & Molde had a little more uncomfortable nights than they'd probably anticipated before the draw was done. The third round looks like this for the British & Irish. Linfield v Fola Esch Shamrock Rovers v Teuta Pacos De ferreira v Larne Hibs v Rijeka Breioblik v Aberdeen Bohemians v PAOK The New Saints v Viktoria plzen Vitesse v Dundalk Aberdeen had a bit of a result tonight as the Icelandics overcame Austrian opposition to set up a more favourable draw imo. There are also fewer restrictions on travel to Iceland at the moment I think. The fourth round draw is on Monday which is where the likes of Spurs and Roma enter. I also expect we'll see St Johnstone in round 4. Of the above, I can only really see Aberdeen, Linfield and Shamrock Rovers with any hope of joining them. Hibs maybe with an outside chance too.
Playoff draw this morning. Looks like we've got to go to Portugal to qualify. Bit tougher than you'd want at this stage Potential upset and embarrassment already.
Brits / Irish have given themselves a real hope of reaching the next round. Larne unsurprisingly well beaten by Portuguese opposition, disappointing result for Linfield too. The rest have all got positive results though. Special mention for TNS beating Viktoria Plzen tonight, Dundalk drawing away at Vitesse and Bohemians beating PAOK. Tough ask to go through but those are impressive results.
Unreal result for TNS, I thought they had no chance against Plzen who've been relatively firm fixtures in the group stages of Europe for the last decade and have got the last 16 of the Europa League a couple of times. I think it goes down as the best result from any side in the Welsh Premier League since it's formation. It's unfortunate they conceded a couple of goals towards the end, as the ties still very much up for grabs now but they're at least in it and regardless of what happens they've done the league proud.
Yeah, incredible result. Such a shame about the late goals as Plzen probably go in to the second leg as favourites to progress still. They've given themselves a great chance though. Would be great to see them finish the job.
TBF Dundalk are actually quite good, they've been the dominant Irish team for like a decade and have made the Europa group stages twice in the past 5 years.
