European coefficients, potential extra Champions League place, any relevance to Newcastle United? – Beragampengetahuan

Ahead of Saturday’s game at home to Bournemouth, there was a feeling of optimism concerning Newcastle United’s push towards a top six finish. Could we even get top five and with it, another tilt at the UEFA Champions League?

The 2-2 draw, and even then, only courtesy of a Matt Ritchie injury time equaliser, probably means the Champions League will be out of reach next season, but nevertheless it’s still worth considering whether that fifth place available to the English Premier League is still a possibility.

The Champions League will expand at the beginning of next season from the current 32-team format to a 36-team one. Of those extra four group-stage places, two will go to the nations whose clubs perform best in this season’s European competitions.

After the group stages of the three competitions, the top of the coefficient rankings looks like this:

Whilst the term ‘coefficient’ has me breaking out in a cold sweat trying to remember ‘O’ level maths from the 1980s, all it means as far as European football is concerned, is that clubs all generate points from participating in European competition, from winning and drawing matches and winning groups or finishing as runner up. That decides how each club has performed (their coefficient), then how each country’s clubs have performed collectively (their season’s coefficients) will eventually decide who gets these two extra Champions League places.

This is why the Czech Republic are currently so handily placed, ranked fifth. Both Slavia and Sparta Prague finished runners up in their Europa League groups whilst Slovan Bratislava finished runners up in their Conference League group. Whether the Czech Republic will last the pace remains to the seen.

As can be seen from the table above, England is currently outside of the top two spots and it is Newcastle United’s elimination from Europe (as well as that of Man U) mainly to blame.

Newcastle United only acquired 8 coefficient points from their six games in the group of death (Man U acquired 7). Newcastle gained two points for beating PSG, two points from draws in Milan and Paris together with four points for participating in the group stage. As for Manchester City, their perfect start to the defence of their crown means they’ve amassed twenty one points; twelve from their group stage wins, four for participating, and five for progressing to the last sixteen.

Regarding England’s chances of improving its position in the coefficient rankings, at least one of Italy or Germany, currently ranked first and second, will see one of their Champions League teams bite the dust in the round of 16 – Lazio will take a slender one goal advantage into the second leg at the Allianz in a couple of weeks’ time so either they or Bayern Munich will fall at this hurdle. Elsewhere, the Italians and the Germans also face off against the Spanish in the last 16 of the Champions League – Real Madrid has already won in the first leg away to RB Leipzig, whilst Napoli entertain Barcelona next Wednesday in the first leg of their last 16 encounter.

As the Champions League progresses, I would expect both Manchester City and Arsenal to get to the business end, both of those clubs will surely make the last four?

In addition, England has all three of its teams still left in the Europa League and Liverpool are hot favourites to win it. Meanwhile, Aston Villa remain in the Conference League and under Unai Emery, himself a past master at steering Sevilla to Europa League glory, they’re strong contenders to win the lesser of European football’s competitions.

As you might expect, Opta has an ‘expected model’ based on a combination of team rankings, each team’s historical and recent performances, and implied betting market odds and the model makes England clear favourites to top the coefficients ranking, with Italy narrowly edging out Germany in second spot.

Either way, this weekend’s results look rather academic as far as Newcastle United and that top five spot in this season’s Premier League is concerned. Or is it? HTL