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Scotland's UEFA coefficient


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With Celtic's elimination from the Champions League, Scotland will not benefit from the additional country ranking point that it would receive from having a side in the group stages. This has, in recent years, kept Scotland from falling further behind comparable nations in the coefficient rankings - used to calculated the number of European places each country receives and what round they start.

I said on one of the qualification threads that it was vital for Scotland to have a team in the Champions League group stages to benefit from these bonus points, but, after having a look at the calculation, I'm not so sure. It's possible that Celtic's earlier elimination from the Champions League will benefit Scotland's coefficient.

Assuming Celtic beat the Baltic team that they will play in the play-off round of the Europa League, Scotland will have a minimum of 3.375 points going into the Europa League group stages. In the group stages, of both the CL & EL, countries (with four teams) receive 0.5 points for winning and 0.25 points for drawing matches. Therefore to make up the lost bonus point, they would have to win two matches. In the past two years, Celtic have obtained an average of 1.625 (for Scotland) from the CL group stages; three wins and a draw is required in the EL group stages to better this.

Should Celtic reach the group stages of the Europa League, they will be in Pot 2*. This will mean that Celtic will avoid a number of the bigger sides in the competition, such as Milan, Marseille and Fenerbahce, increasing their chances of winning matches. A group of Anderlecht, Celtic, Maccabi Tel Aviv and Midtjylland (as an example) looks passable for Celtic, with all games winnable on paper, unlike any Champions League group Celtic could've received.

It appears then, that our best chance of increasing the coefficient in future seasons will come from the Europa League - with our national champions' Champions League group stage appearances probably being a negative for our points.

Of course, that's without even looking at Rangers and Hibernian, this season. Rangers are in a good position to progress to the play-off round and would play either Ufa or Progres, both of which are winnable games (unless they get Pedro back 😉). Hibs won't be favourites going into their game against Molde, but a clean sheet at home may be enough if they can get a goal. Their potential reward appears to be Dinamo Minsk (who are 4-0 up over Zenit - somehow?), which on paper seems winnable too. It's not currently, inconceivable that we could have three teams in the group stages of the Europa League, but it will be very unlikely to actually happen.

Scotland's potential coefficient (2018-19 season) as of 15 August:

  • At present: 3.125 (-0.125 on 2013-14)
  • If Celtic reach group stage of EL: +0.250/+0.500 (min/max)
  • If Rangers or Hibs reach group stage: +0.375/+0.750 (min/max)
  • If all reach group stage: +1.000/+2.000 (min/max)

*Celtic will be in Pot 1 if three of Sevilla, Zenit, Basel, Besiktas, Olympiacos, Ludogorets and Copenhagen fail to reach the group stage. Red Bull Salzburg and PSV Eindhoven are the only teams still in the Champions League qualifiers that have a higher coefficient than Celtic.

Edited by Clyde1998
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2 hours ago, Clyde1998 said:

With Celtic's elimination from the Champions League, Scotland will not benefit from the additional country ranking point that it would receive from having a side in the group stages. This has, in recent years, kept Scotland from falling further behind comparable nations in the coefficient rankings - used to calculated the number of European places each country receives and what round they start.

I said on one of the qualification threads that it was vital for Scotland to have a team in the Champions League group stages to benefit from these bonus points, but, after having a look at the calculation, I'm not so sure. It's possible that Celtic's earlier elimination from the Champions League will benefit Scotland's coefficient.

Assuming Celtic beat the Baltic team that they will play in the play-off round of the Europa League, Scotland will have a minimum of 3.375 points going into the Europa League group stages. In the group stages, of both the CL & EL, countries (with four teams) receive 0.5 points for winning and 0.25 points for drawing matches. Therefore to make up the lost bonus point, they would have to win two matches. In the past two years, Celtic have obtained an average of 1.625 (for Scotland) from the CL group stages; three wins and a draw is required in the EL group stages to better this.

Should Celtic reach the group stages of the Europa League, they will be in Pot 2*. This will mean that Celtic will avoid a number of the bigger sides in the competition, such as Milan, Marseille and Fenerbahce, increasing their chances of winning matches. A group of Anderlecht, Celtic, Maccabi Tel Aviv and Midtjylland (as an example) looks passable for Celtic, with all games winnable on paper, unlike any Champions League group Celtic could've received.

It appears then, that our best chance of increasing the coefficient in future seasons will come from the Europa League - with our national champions' Champions League group stage appearances probably being a negative for our points.

Of course, that's without even looking at Rangers and Hibernian, this season. Rangers are in a good position to progress to the play-off round and would play either Ufa or Progres, both of which are winnable games (unless they get Pedro back 😉). Hibs won't be favourites going into their game against Molde, but a clean sheet at home may be enough if they can get a goal. Their potential reward appears to be Dinamo Minsk (who are 4-0 up over Zenit - somehow?), which on paper seems winnable too. It's not currently, inconceivable that we could have three teams in the group stages of the Europa League, but it will be very unlikely to actually happen.

Scotland's potential coefficient (2018-19 season) as of 15 August:

  • At present: 3.125 (-0.125 on 2013-14)
  • If Celtic reach group stage of EL: +0.250/+0.500 (min/max)
  • If Rangers or Hibs reach group stage: +0.375/+0.750 (min/max)
  • If all reach group stage: +1.000/+2.000 (min/max)

*Celtic will be in Pot 1 if three of Sevilla, Zenit, Basel, Besiktas, Olympiacos, Ludogorets and Copenhagen fail to reach the group stage. Red Bull Salzburg and PSV Eindhoven are the only teams still in the Champions League qualifiers that have a higher coefficient than Celtic.

Clyde your posts are, as ever, far more useful than anything in the MSM. 

Fingers crossed for Rangers and Hibs tomorrow and then let's see what they can achieve with a bit of confidence behind them. 

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So Celtic qualifying for the Champions league and getting rode all over Europe is worse for Scottish football than them dropping in to the Europa provided they win some games their.

Great stuff statto! You should find a way to monetise some of the stuff you do!

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21 hours ago, RenfrewBlue said:

Clyde your posts are, as ever, far more useful than anything in the MSM. 

Fingers crossed for Rangers and Hibs tomorrow and then let's see what they can achieve with a bit of confidence behind them. 

 

21 hours ago, sbcmfc said:

So Celtic qualifying for the Champions league and getting rode all over Europe is worse for Scottish football than them dropping in to the Europa provided they win some games their.

Great stuff statto! You should find a way to monetise some of the stuff you do!

Thank you. 😃

The basic principle behind the system is that winning games and having multiple sides doing well is the best way to obtain points. The CL bonus points are only be beneficial if you can also win games at that stage, when compared to winning games in the EL.

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1 hour ago, Clyde1998 said:

The basic principle behind the system is that winning games and having multiple sides doing well is the best way to obtain points. The CL bonus points are only be beneficial if you can also win games at that stage, when compared to winning games in the EL.

Presumably that's how countries like Austria, Denmark and Croatia are in the top 15 for UEFA coefficient?

 

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37 minutes ago, Toepoke said:

Presumably that's how countries like Austria, Denmark and Croatia are in the top 15 for UEFA coefficient?

Yes. While we've had more appearances in the CL group stages than these countries, they've had much more appearances in the EL group stages. They've all had seasons with multiple teams in the group stages of European competition within the past five seasons. The sides that don't reach the group stages also tend to get further in the qualifiers than our teams.

Since the demise of Rangers, we've only had one side that can reach the group stages of European competition and that's a major factor as to why our coefficient has plummeted. If another team (most likely Rangers) can reach the group stages of the EL consistently along with Celtic, our coefficient may return to being one of the top fifteen in the next few years. Further progress by our sides in the qualifiers will help too.

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We are still 23rd after yesterday.

Poland (21st) have no teams left in Europe. Sweden (22nd) and Belarus (20th) are down to 1 side so we have a great chance to making ground on all of them. Croatia (15th) are the only other country above us with less teams than us left in the 2 competitions.

Behind us, Norway (26th) have 3 sides left. Romania (29th) and Slovakia (31st) have 2 sides left. The rest have either 1 or none left.

We've already matched our 13/14 total which this season is replacing in the calculation. But that was our weakest year other than 15/16. 

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7 hours ago, PASTA Mick said:

We are still 23rd after yesterday.

Poland (21st) have no teams left in Europe. Sweden (22nd) and Belarus (20th) are down to 1 side so we have a great chance to making ground on all of them. Croatia (15th) are the only other country above us with less teams than us left in the 2 competitions.

Behind us, Norway (26th) have 3 sides left. Romania (29th) and Slovakia (31st) have 2 sides left. The rest have either 1 or none left.

We've already matched our 13/14 total which this season is replacing in the calculation. But that was our weakest year other than 15/16. 

With the draw they both have you have to fancy both teams to reach the group stages now. 

So we'll be improving considerably, hopefully. 

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10 hours ago, RenfrewBlue said:

With the draw they both have you have to fancy both teams to reach the group stages now. 

So we'll be improving considerably, hopefully. 

I wouldn’t mind both teams going through, as it gives an interest in the competition.

Would suggest though that the Russian team must be half decent to have qualified. I’m sure it was the unheard of Russian team Motherwell played that had Djibril Cisse on the bench. :lol:

I wouldnt underestimate them and their spending power.

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9 hours ago, sbcmfc said:

I wouldn’t mind both teams going through, as it gives an interest in the competition.

Would suggest though that the Russian team must be half decent to have qualified. I’m sure it was the unheard of Russian team Motherwell played that had Djibril Cisse on the bench. :lol:

I wouldnt underestimate them and their spending power.

It was more the fact they struggled to beat Progrès. They were pants last season and even the Rangers squad at the end of last season would have beaten them. 

And we're significantly better so far this season. 

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3 hours ago, RenfrewBlue said:

It was more the fact they struggled to beat Progrès. They were pants last season and even the Rangers squad at the end of last season would have beaten them. 

And we're significantly better so far this season. 

Fair point.

:lol:

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7 minutes ago, Clyde1998 said:

We're up to 22nd now - jumping above Sweden. 3.625 points so far this season for a total of 19.000. If both Rangers and Celtic get through next week, we'll also move above Poland.

Would be very optimistic of 2 wins next week 👍

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33 minutes ago, Clyde1998 said:

We're up to 22nd now - jumping above Sweden. 3.625 points so far this season for a total of 19.000. If both Rangers and Celtic get through next week, we'll also move above Poland.

Big week next week because it's the game points and bonus points for making the group stages. 

Celtic should get through but we need to improve. Rangers have given themselves a great chance but any match in Russia is tricky. 

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1 hour ago, PASTA Mick said:

We have moved up to 21st after tonight. Belarus and Serbia are the two teams above us and they both have 1 team left in. 

Belarus are only a win ahead of us - having an extra team in the group stages makes it quite likely that we'll jump above them this season. A win would also give us our best season in Europe since 2007-08.

To climb above Serbia, we'll need four wins and a draw more than them. Red Star's CL group looks very difficult (PSG, Napoli, Liverpool), so they'll probably not get many points, nor drop into the EL. Celtic are in Pot 2 - so they'll, hopefully, get a favourable draw, while Rangers (Pot 4) will likely have a much harder time - but a lot of sides in Pot 3 (and a couple in Pot 2) look beatable, especially at Ibrox.

Beyond that Cyprus are six wins and a draw ahead - with two teams in the EL - so they'll probably be too far ahead to catch this season. They're 18th, which would see their champions start in the second qualifying round of the CL, rather than the first. 17th gives the cup winners a bye to the third qualifying round of the EL, while runners-up start in the second.

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  • 3 weeks later...

With this week's results, the coefficient table looks like this:

  1. Spain - 88.569
  2. England - 66.749
  3. Italy - 66.154
  4. Germany - 61.070
  5. France - 51.832
  6. Russia - 45.883
  7. Portugal - 40.432
  8. Ukraine - 35.500
  9. Belgium - 35.100
  10. Turkey - 31.800
  11. Netherlands - 27.833
  12. Austria - 27.450
  13. Denmark - 26.275
  14. Greece - 25.800
  15. Switzerland - 25.300
  16. Croatia - 24.375
  17. Czech Rep - 24.175
  18. Cyprus - 22.925
  19. Serbia - 21.750
  20. Belarus - 20.375
  21. Scotland - 20.125
  22. Poland - 19.250
  23. Sweden - 19.150
  24. Israel - 19.000
  25. Norway - 18.950
  26. Azerbaijan - 18.500
  27. Kazakhstan - 18.000
  28. Bulgaria - 16.500
  29. Romania - 15.950
  30. Slovenia - 15.000
  31. Slovakia - 14.875
  32. Liechtenstein - 13.500
  33. Hungary - 9.250
  34. Macedonia - 8.000
  35. Moldova - 7.750
  36. Albania - 7.500
  37. Ireland - 7.450
  38. Finland - 7.275
  39. Iceland - 7.250
  40. Bosnia - 7.125
  41. Lithuania - 6.750
  42. Latvia - 5.625
  43. Armenia - 5.250
  44. Luxembourg - 5.250
  45. Malta - 5.125
  46. Estonia - 5.000
  47. Georgia - 4.750
  48. Wales - 4.125
  49. Montenegro - 4.125
  50. Faroe Is - 4.000
  51. Gibraltar - 4.000
  52. N Ireland - 3.875
  53. Kosovo - 2.500
  54. Andorra - 1.831
  55. San Marino - 0.666

Our coefficient of 20.125 is our highest since the 2011-12 season, with our seasonal coefficient of 4.750 our highest since 2007-08.

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14 minutes ago, Clyde1998 said:

With this week's results, the coefficient table looks like this:

  1. Spain - 88.569
  2. England - 66.749
  3. Italy - 66.154
  4. Germany - 61.070
  5. France - 51.832
  6. Russia - 45.883
  7. Portugal - 40.432
  8. Ukraine - 35.500
  9. Belgium - 35.100
  10. Turkey - 31.800
  11. Netherlands - 27.833
  12. Austria - 27.450
  13. Denmark - 26.275
  14. Greece - 25.800
  15. Switzerland - 25.300
  16. Croatia - 24.375
  17. Czech Rep - 24.175
  18. Cyprus - 22.925
  19. Serbia - 21.750
  20. Belarus - 20.375
  21. Scotland - 20.125
  22. Poland - 19.250
  23. Sweden - 19.150
  24. Israel - 19.000
  25. Norway - 18.950
  26. Azerbaijan - 18.500
  27. Kazakhstan - 18.000
  28. Bulgaria - 16.500
  29. Romania - 15.950
  30. Slovenia - 15.000
  31. Slovakia - 14.875
  32. Liechtenstein - 13.500
  33. Hungary - 9.250
  34. Macedonia - 8.000
  35. Moldova - 7.750
  36. Albania - 7.500
  37. Ireland - 7.450
  38. Finland - 7.275
  39. Iceland - 7.250
  40. Bosnia - 7.125
  41. Lithuania - 6.750
  42. Latvia - 5.625
  43. Armenia - 5.250
  44. Luxembourg - 5.250
  45. Malta - 5.125
  46. Estonia - 5.000
  47. Georgia - 4.750
  48. Wales - 4.125
  49. Montenegro - 4.125
  50. Faroe Is - 4.000
  51. Gibraltar - 4.000
  52. N Ireland - 3.875
  53. Kosovo - 2.500
  54. Andorra - 1.831
  55. San Marino - 0.666

Our coefficient of 20.125 is our highest since the 2011-12 season, with our seasonal coefficient of 4.750 our highest since 2007-08.

Am I right in thinking BATE Borisov are the only team from Belarus still in?

Recon we can catch them?

   
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37 minutes ago, Fairbairn said:

Where were we at the start of the season?

We started the season in 26th place. 

We were 23rd the year before that.

The difference between the two is that this season the cup winners (Aberdeen in this case) started the Europa League a round later than they would next season.

We need to get to 17th which would result in 1 less round for 3 of our 4 teams in Europe. 

 

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