UEFA Cup Spot for…FULHAM?!?

Football is a funny game. One minute you’re holding on by your fingernails to keep from being relegated, and the next there’s a strong possibility that you’re headed for Europe.

That’s the situation facing Fulham, a team whose relegation fears went down to the wire. They were not able to put those fears to rest until the 76th minute of yesterday’s game, a 1-0 victory over Portsmouth.

Fulham spent much of the season in the drop zone before putting together an strong late run that saw them win four out of their last five games. They managed to stay up in the Premier League on goal differential, with their -22 being three better than Reading’s -25.

And now, improbably, there is at least a fair chance that they’re looking at a UEFA Cup slot for next year.

Here’s how it works.

Back in 93-94, UEFA decided that improving fair play in the game was a worthy goal.

The UEFA Fair Play Competition, which was introduced in the 1993/94 season gives three countries the chance to enter an additional club for the UEFA Cup. UEFA maintains a ranking list based on all national and club matches played between May 1 and Apr 30 (in the past this period was June 1 to May 31) in all UEFA competitions except the UEFA Regions Cup. The association that tops the ranking automaticly qualifies for a UEFA Cup place. All associations which achieved an average of 8 points or more go into a draw to determine the other two places. The three UEFA Cup places go to the club which won the domestic fair play competition.

England finished at the top of the rankings for the season, and on Friday, UEFA officially announced that they had earned the automatic UEFA Cup spot. This means that the spot in the tournament will go to the top EPL team which has not already qualified for European competition.

Until yesterday, it looked as if the winner would be Manchester City, a team that finished a respectable ninth in the league. But City player Richard Dunne got sent off in yesterday’s 8-1 slaughter at the hands of Middlesbrough, and most sources think that this will be enough to drop them out of contention. Next team on the list who’s not yet Europe-bound?

Fulham.

And so we could be looking at an odd situation where a team that escaped relegation only on goal differential will be heading off to play some of the best teams on the continent.

Or not.

The full rules for determining who gets the slot feel interestingly squishy and, from what I can tell, are not public.

Fulham’s communications officer Sarah Brooks said: “It is a complicated situation in which administration efficiency is also taken into consideration as well as on-field behaviour but we know we are in a good position and expect to have confirmation from the Premier League early next week.”

“Administration efficiency”? Sounds like it could be a complicated way of saying, “We don’t want teams that suck representing our country in Europe.” Which would be an interesting turn of events in a competition intended to reward teams for doing the right thing and playing by the rules.

We’ll find out more when the announcement of the winning team is made next week.

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Category: Europe