UEFA will rename their third club competition from the start of the 2024/25 season, although Celtic are unlikely to feature in it again.
European football’s governing body have recently announced some decisions made at a Wednesday meeting in Nyon. (UEFA)
The renaming of the ‘UEFA Europa Conference League’ to the ‘UEFA Conference League’ seems to be the most notable finding.
As UEFA put it: “Research amongst fans as well as commercial partners has found that removing ‘Europa’ from the name of the competition will enable further development as a stand-alone competition.”
Celtic have played just two matches in the competition since its introduction at the start of the 2021/22 campaign.
We lost them both to Norwegian outfit Bodo/Glimt. The matches are unlikely to have produced many good memories for Celtic supporters.
While we do have recent experience in the competition, it seems extremely unlikely that we will play another match at that level.
Next season is out of the question given that we will feature in the Champions League group stage. We can only drop down to the Europa League from that competition.
After that, UEFA are scrapping all drop-downs in their new ‘swiss system’ format. (Independent)
That means that there will be no option to fall in to the Europa League from the Champions League, or to the Conference League from the Europa League.
Given that we are unlikely to finish third or below in the Premiership anytime soon, it seems like the Europa League would be as low as we could fall.
Barry Robson’s Aberdeen are already guaranteed Conference League group stage football next season, but they could still earn a Europa League place too.
We’ll stick to the Champions League. That name isn’t going anywhere anytime soon.
In other news, Hyeongyu Oh is the latest Celtic star to send out a positive pre-season message
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