Fifth place in the Champions League for the Italians: it’s done. The finish line was one step away even before last night’s matches, but with the results of the quarterfinals of the Serie A teams the points necessary to obtain mathematical confirmation from the rankings have arrived. Despite Atalanta’s defeat against Liverpool, in fact, the Dea eliminated the English, qualifying for the semi-finals of the Europa League, together with Roma who got the better of Milan, while West Ham was stopped by Bayern Leverkusen. So all the planets in the football system aligned, thanks also to Fiorentina’s passage to the penultimate round of the Conference League against Viktoria Plzen, allowing our federation to maintain a definitive gap from England in the UEFA rankings.
The extra place in the Champions League
The calculation with which the points useful for the seasonal ranking for federations are assigned, starting from the direct elimination phase, is the same for all three European competitions: 2 points for victory, 1 for draw, one bonus point for each round passed, plus 2 points in case of victory in the final in the 90 minutes or 1 point in case of draw. At the end of each day, the total points are divided by the number of teams that participated in the cups for each country: Italy and Germany for 7, England for 8.
In light of the outcome of the quarter-finals in the Champions League, Europe and Conference League, the UEFA rankings it is updated like this:
- Italy 19,428,
- Germany 17,928,
- England 17,375
- France 16,083
- Spain 15,312
Considering that the championships that can earn an extra place in the next edition of the Champions League are the first two, Italy is sure to participate with five teams: in the three European competitions there is only one English team left, Aston Villa, which if even if they win the Conference League it would not allow England to close the gap with our federation.
The additional access to the Italian teams in the new Champions League format is therefore guaranteed, but the qualified Serie A teams could become six if a “simple” condition were met: the winner of the Europa League has rightful access to the top European competition , so if one of Atalanta and Roma were to win the trophy without placing in the top five places in the league, then an additional pass would be unlocked.
A circumstance that would make the president of Fgic even happier, Gabriele Gravina, already largely satisfied with the goal achieved: “The participation of five Italian teams in the next Champions League represents a great result for the entire movement. After the record number of qualifiers for the final stages of UEFA competitions last year, having repeated ourselves with three Italians in the semi-finals again in this edition generates new opportunities to be seized to enhance the brand of Italian football.”
“I thank all the clubs who made it possible, now let’s work together to make these extraordinary results stable and long-lasting” the number one of the Football Federation told Adnkronos.
The new Champions
Italy’s conquest of the extra slot in the next Champions League was possible due to the new format of the competition which will start from next season. In fact, with the UEFA reform of European competitions, the number of participants will be expanded to 36 teams and for this reason they will be added four more placeswhich will be determined by the ranking achieved by the teams in their respective national competitions across Europe, in combination with the position occupied by each association in the UEFA rankings.
The four extra Champions League places will be assigned according to the following methods:
- access to the competition will be guaranteed to the team that finished third in the previous federation championship in fifth place according to the UEFA club coefficient rankings per country.
- the second slot will instead be allocated to the winner of a national championship, among those participating in the “Champions path” of the qualifications for the competition (consisting of four rounds) dedicated to the federations lower in the ranking. The number of clubs taking part in this phase of the tournament will increase from four to five.
- the last two places added will be assigned to the federations whose clubs achieved the best results in the previous season, adding the scores achieved by the teams divided by the number of participating clubs from the respective federations. The countries that will be entitled to a place each in the championship phase (‘European Performance Spot’) will be able to field in the Champions League the club ranked immediately after those entitled to automatic qualification.
Tags: sixth place QuiFinanza
