After all this excitement about winning the Europa League, we'll get knocked out by Motherwell in the qualifying round.
?????To get to Gdansk we will need to really pull together. We'll need Solidarity!
I remember the CL scare at Young BoysAfter all this excitement about winning the Europa League, we'll get knocked out by Motherwell in the qualifying round.
Don't discount the possibility of fat fingers. It's either that or rank stupidity but i'd be inclined to call fat fingers because i'm a nice guy. Well hung and nice.
Chelsea win = No Europa for Arsenal.
Good or Bad ? Financially a hit but clears they way with less to concentrate on ?
Coefficient doesn't effect what round you enter, just the seedings. We'll potentially have to play qualifying because we'd be taken the last English slot (Arsenal would take first priority as cup winners, then Leicester as 5th place, and finally us as 6th getting a place by virtue of Man City winning the League Cup while also being in a European spot in the league).So why is our coefficient so low we have to play 3 pre-qualifiers to show we are worthy of this 2nd rate competition?
We have been pretty OK in europe for quite a few years now, so it makes me wonder how many pre-qualifiers Sheffield utd would have had to play if they qualified instead. 20?
Bayer Leverkusen and Roma (crazy to think they made the champions league semi-final 2 seasons ago) also decent teams, and you know Soldado with Grenada could come back to haunt us, or Vieria with Nice.Some clubs I see as potential threats:
Villarreal:
Spanish teams always do well in Europe especially Europa League, Villarreal are a very decent team and their new manager is Emery who is a Europa League specialist
Real Sociedad:
Fell apart at the end of the season after a very good start. Ødegaard who is a top player could stay one more season, Isak & Oyarzabal will be even better. Also a Spanish club and I fear them in this competition
Leicester:
Don’t know how serious they will take it but they have a good young team who will keep on improving
Wolves:
Strong team who takes this competition seriously. Seems to get better for every year and are good against top teams
Napoli:
Become a very solid team under Gattuso, Koulibaly likely to stay and they will sign Osimhen. Looks like they will lose Allan, will be interesting to see who replaces him
Milan:
Have become a complete different team since Zlatan came back with his winning mentality. Kessie & Bennacer are beasts in midfield
There are other decent/good teams and teams who finished third in the CL group stage will go to the knockout stages but these teams are the real threats so far imo