How Rangers could bypass qualifiers and reach Champions League

Rangers drew with Olympiakos in Greece in the Europa League in 2024 [SNS] It has been a steady stream of bad news for Scotland's club sides in European competition in the past couple of seasons but events in Greece over the weekend could make it less of a tragedy for one of the three potential Scottish Premiership champions. Such has been the drop in Scotland's co-efficient in recent seasons that title winners Celtic and runners-up Rangers both had to enter the Champions League at the qualifying stage this season - and both failed to do so, dropping down to the Europa League. It is the same again for next season as Heart of Midlothian, Rangers and Celtic all chase the title and the other spot in the Champions League qualifiers.

If Hearts, whose lead over Rangers was down to a point after the weekend results, or third-top Celtic finish top, they will be one of four league champions placed in the play-off round next season. However, if Rangers secure their first title since 2021, Danny Rohl's side could qualify directly for the league phase - and it would be thanks to Olympiakos. Or, more precisely, to AEK Athens.

If that's all Greek to you, read on. Arsenal's Rice and Gabriel train before Lisbon trip O'Neill hails Celtic spirit as they stay in title hunt 'We're still top of the league' - McInnes' Hearts reminder to himself & doubters Since 2024, European governing body Uefa has given club coefficients over the latest five-year period an important role via something called "title-holder rebalancing". Therefore, should the Champions League winners have also qualified for the league phase via their domestic league position, "the club with the best individual coefficient of all the domestic champions involved in qualifying will enter the league phase directly instead of the original round they had qualified for".

Ironically, last season's beneficiaries were Olympiakos, with European champions Paris St-Germain having already qualified as French title winners. The Piraeus side had finished seven points behind Athens neighbours AEK in the Greek Super League but this season the positions look likely to be reversed. A 1-0 defeat at home to an AEK side for whom former Hearts left-back James Penrice was back in the starting line-up after a two-game absence leaves Olympiakos five points adrift of the leaders.