Manchester United bid to win the Europa League tonight with their Final against Villareal taking place in Gdansk and televised live here on Virgin Media One.
Next season the European competition landscape will be different with the creation of the Europa Conference League expanding the number of teams that will get to play in European competition expanding to 184.
The trophy for the tournament was launched yesterday and the route on how teams will qualify features in a video that can be seen on the UEFA website here.
At least one team will qualify to play in the competition from each of Europe’s 55 Associations with one team from the top five leagues and the nations ranked 51st to 55th; two teams from the nations ranked sixth to 15th and three teams in the group ranked between 16th and 50th.
There will be three qualifying rounds for the Conference tournament with the winners going into a playoff round and an eventual eight groups of four teams.
The Europa League group stage will expand to four home and four away games in groups of five and the Champions League will have a single League format for 36 teams with five home and five away matches, straight qualification to the last 16 for the top eight and the teams finishing 9th to 24th playing off for the other eight places.
There is mobility between the Conference League and the Europa League, and between the Europa League and the Champions’ League, seeking to give an opportunity at least to everyone to take part.
The Republic of Ireland currently lies 37th in the co-efficient table with Northern Ireland in 41st so both will have an additional team going forward into European competition next season.
It will take a while to get used to and we certainly wouldn’t want any disruption to the way the tournaments are run but it will all become clear once the games start.
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