Celtic in Europe in 22-23 Season

Just for anyone who may have spent the past few months living under a rock, here is the current situation.

If Celtic win this season's Scottish Premiership, we enter the Champion League at the group stage.

HOWEVER, if this season's Champions League winner does not qualify for the group stage via their league standing then Celtic will enter at the play-off round.

Currently the only real threat of this situation happening comes from Villareal who will play the winner of the Benfica/Liverpool tie, where Liverpool won 3-1 in Portugal. The return leg at Anfield is tonight.

The situation for Celtic may change depending on whether or not Russian clubs are admitted to UEFA competitions next season's.in the case that they are banned and Villareal win the Champions League, we would still go straight into the groupstage.

All this hinges on us winning the league which is far from job done but I have faith in our big sexy manager

 

Liverpool will pump Benfica, pump Villarreal, don’t care if they pump city or get pumped in the final coz we’ll pump the huns on Sunday and I think we’ll pump every team in the league in our final 5 games. Most satisfying £40 million ever!! The huns are fukin fuked! YAAS!

 

How does the russian involvement next year have any bearing on whether we are in direct to the groups or not?
As it stands we are 9th in the league co-efficient and Russia 10th, they can't over take us now.

 

I had it in my head they were going off how things stood at the end of last season, when presumably Scotland and Russia's roles were reversed. They said the same thing on 67 Hail Hail on YouTube

 

No way Villarreal win the Champions League

 

Currently Russia are 8th and Scotland are 11th UNTIL season ends.
If Russian teams are reinstated we WONT be in Group Stages.
If they are suspended we are in


https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2022–23_UEFA_Champions_League

 

Aye you might be right, I keep forgetting this season effects the season after next

 

Aye I was getting confused by current rankings

 

If we get into the champions league groups via the direct route or play off then I couldn’t give a * about getting pumped because, show me the money.

 

So I don't want to sound like a pessimistic *, but who are the teams we could potentially face if

A - Villareal win the CL
B - We finish second.

I assume qualifying to the CL via second place would be near impossible.

 

If a happens or Russia are allowed back in. We could likely be seeded so could play any league winners 12th or below, good chance of a Scandinavian team.
Come 2nd and there could be some right * like PSV or Benfica.

 

Liverpool vs Man City final.

Liverpool to win that whilst City win the EPL.

Who we wanting in the groups?

 

Direct entry into the group stage is massive for us if we can get it.

A full summer without early qualifiers would be amazing and a great chance to earn some cash in these lucrative friendlies.

I know even the playoff is later on but we should be able to have a pre-season without the stress of a massive qualifier on day 1.

 

It would be fantastic to get straight in and not worry about qualifiers.

 

As others have mentioned automatic group stage would be huge.

For transfers - We would know our budget for next season before the end of May so can have that clarity in our transfer business e.g. do a January go get our targets as quickly as possible. We could also be a big draw for out of contract players.

For Preseason - having a proper preseason after a proper break is massive for us to be geared up to hit the ground running come the start of the league.

Financially - We could look at preseason opportunities for glamour games. I see spurs are playing a K league Select XI, could we do that with Japan? Given the change in shirt sponsorship rules, we need to change Dafabet, could we tempt a big Japanese company to get interested? Yokohama Tyres sponsored Chelsea at a point could some like that or one of their tech or car companies be tempted? They may even then sponsor a preseason tour of Japan? AIA sponsor spurs given their link with Son.

 

For sponsors I'm sure a few Aussie companies would love to be linked with Ange, especially with the tourney in November

 

Tbqh, as great as automatic qualification would be, I wouldn’t be worried about a play-off under Ange, especially since it’d be towards the end of the transfer window, with a full pre-season, a few league games and a ‘champions route’ seeding under our belts.

Vastly different scenario than entering a 2nd or 3rd round qualifier with squad gaps needing filled, little-to-no pre-season, and (more often than not) a manager clueless as to how to navigate our way through those sorts of niche waters.

Only thing that makes automatic qualification a really big deal for me is the guarantee of big £ - as others have said.

 

Both have to happen for us not to get into the group stages of the champions league.

Villareal winning the CL AND Russian teams getting reinstated would need to happen before we need to play a play-off(if we win the league).

Russian involvement only needs to be taken into account if a team wins the champions league without directly qualifying through their league.(in this case, only Villareal can do that)

 

I would imagine both Dafabet and Magners would have to agree to a change in shirt sponsorship for one game.

 

I've no idea how our style, firmly bedded in by then, will do in CL.

Hasn't been the most enjoyable place for us in recent years, have enjoyed the EL way more, go into matches feeling like you have an actual chance of victory.