HOPE springs eternal – but it’s fair to say it’s been an utterly brutal campaign for Scotland’s coefficient so far.
Celtic have crashed out of Champions League qualification to Kairat Almaty, although the Hoops haven’t given up yet on an extended run in the Europa League.
Rangers were humbled 9-1 on aggregate by Club Brugge in Champions League qualifying but are up against it with three straight defeats in the Europa League to date.
And Aberdeen – locked in a tough Conference League group where every point is a prisoner – are the only other Scottish team still standing.
All in all, the campaign is so grim that we currently sit in THIRTY FOURTH position in Europe for average coefficient points won during the 2025-26 campaign (2.4).
For reference, that’s behind North Macedonia, Armenia and the Republic of Ireland during this campaign.
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And for the record, the 5.5 points contributed by Shelbourne to the Irish pot is more than any Scottish team has chipped into the total, with Celtic on 4.0 and Rangers on just 2.5.
There IS at least some good news for Scottish teams, though, because most Uefa calculations are done from a five-year coefficient.
And our teams still have last season’s 14th placed finish in the five-year Uefa coefficient rankings to live off.
That guarantees that the top TWO finishers in the Scottish Premiership this season still at least have a shot at reaching the money-spinning promised land of the Champions League for one more season.
Should Celtic win the title, they will have to win just one match – the Champions League playoff round – to negotiated, just as they were unable to do last season.
The same would apply to Hearts if they can keep up their current form or to Rangers if things pick up under Danny Rohl and can win the title.
Our Scottish Cup winners this year will enter at the third qualifying round of the Europa League, rather than the playoff round with our third and fourth place finishers both entering the Conference League path
Should the Gers claim only their second title in 15 years, though, they COULD still benefit from an automatic Champions League phase spot by dint of their excellent five-year club coefficient.
But that first assumes that this season’s Champions League winners also qualify for Europe’s top club competition by their league placing.
And it’s also a spot which is at major risk of being ripped off them should Bodo/Glimt record the Norwegian title (they’re currently second) and outstrip them in the five-year ranking stakes.
But the biggest problem of all is that when this season’s results are added to the results from the last four campaigns, the live Scottish country coefficient (governing our European entrants for 2027-28) remains locked in no better than EIGHTEENTH without great great prospects of advancing.
For example, let’s look at Cyprus – who sit one spot above us in the rankings at 17th.
They still have three out of their four teams still active – including Paphos, who have drawn two Champions League phase ties, and Europa League high-flyers AEK Larnaca.
Climbing up the ladder to FIFTEENTH spot is the minimum Scotland would need to retain our two potential Champions League qualifiers beyond next season.
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Anything less than that and our champions would have to play THREE Champions League qualifiers and our runners-up would face three qualifiers just to book a spot in the CONFERENCE LEAGUE.
Our overall number of qualifiers would drop from five to four too, and if ever there’s a stat to focus minds ahead of European clashes this week that is it.
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