Scotland’s automatic Champions League spot is in jeopardy as the Czech Republic is only one win away from securing the coveted top-10 position.
Following Rangers’ close Europa League loss to Benfica at Ibrox last night, Scotland’s ranking in the top 10 of the UEFA coefficient standings is in jeopardy, raising concerns amongst Glasgow rivals Celtic.
Because of Scotland’s unusually high coefficient, the champions of the Scottish Premiership have been guaranteed a position in the Champions League group stage for the past two seasons. However, their qualification is now in jeopardy.
Due to their back-to-back league wins, Celtic have been automatically placed in the competition’s group stage draw, avoiding any involvement in the qualification rounds. The runners-up were compelled to compete in qualifying. However, all of that could alter as soon as the 2025–2026 season begins.
Now, all of Scotland’s hopes are with the Czech team Viktoria Plzen, who need only one draw from the two legs of their Europa Conference League quarterfinal after defeating Servette, who defeated Rangers in Champion League qualifying on penalties after two games ended in a 0-0 aggregate draw.
In order to maintain their crucial top-10 ranking, Scotland needs Plzen to lose both of its games; else, they will fall behind in the coefficient standings. There were three Czech teams participating in the European knockout stage opposed to just one for the Scots. On Thursday, Rangers lost to the Portuguese champions at home, and Slavia Prague and city rivals Sparta also lost and were ousted from the Europa League.
Plzen is now the only remaining Czech club, and when the draw is done on Friday, they will find out who their last eight opponents are. Celtic, in particular, would suffer a serious setback if they fell outside the top 10, since they would need to go through the play-off round in order to attempt to get into the Champions League proper if they wanted to win the league the following year.
But, because of their prior success in European play, Rangers’ strong club coefficient—which presently stands at 25th in Europe—might be sufficient to shield them from the negative effects of Scotland’s country coefficient falling in the rankings.
Each association’s results in the Champions League, Europa League, and Europa Conference League during the previous five seasons—including the current campaign—are ranked by UEFA’s coefficient.
With Celtic only managing one win as they were eliminated from the Champions League, Rangers was left to lead the way for Scotland this season after topping their Europa League group ahead of Sparta Prague. Despite a tough group stage performance, Aberdeen was eliminated from the Europa Conference League, and Hearts and Hibs of Edinburgh both failed in their respective qualifiers.
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