Four Scottish clubs are in European action on Thursday, with kick-offs spread between 7pm and 7.45pm. Hopefully, by the end of the night, all four will still be involved and Scotland will have five clubs in Europe at the play-off stage for only the second time.

The first was in 2023/24, when Celtic went directly into the Champions League group stage and Aberdeen, Hearts, Hibs and Rangers all contested play-off ties. This time, if all make it through, then Scottish football would have five sides playing in the UEFA play-off round for the first time ever.

Celtic don’t enter Europe until the Champions League play-off round, while Hearts and Rangers are guaranteed either a Europa League or Conference League play-off place. Hibs and Motherwell have no such safety net; defeat for either would bring their European campaign to an end.

Shkëndija Vs Hibernian (19:00)

Hibs take a 2-1 lead to Skopje after Warren O’Hora’s 90th-minute goal settled a tight first leg at Easter Road. Owen Elding had opened the scoring before Marko Gjorgjievski equalised two minutes later, leaving Hibs with a slender advantage to protect in the National Arena Todor Proeski.

O’Hora’s winner was followed three days later by Callum Wright’s 90+3 goal at Ibrox. Those were the 28th and 29th matches Hibs have won with a goal in the 90th minute or later since 1990, but only the second time they have managed it in consecutive games.

In January 2010, Danny Galbraith scored a 92nd minute winner at Celtic Park before a 93rd minute own-goal by future Hibs manager Jack Ross at home to St Mirren three days later sealed Hibs’ only other pair of back-to-back 90+ minute winners since 1990.

That 2-1 victory over Rangers was Hibs’ third consecutive away league win, their longest run since four in a row ended in September 2020. Shkëndija also enjoyed a winning domestic weekend, 2-0 away to reigning champions Vardar. They have opened the North Macedonian league season with two wins and two clean sheets, scoring five without reply.

Hibs have lost only one of their last four European away matches, although that was the 2-0 defeat at Malisheva last month which nearly ended this campaign before it had really begun. Shkëndija have won seven of their last 10 European home games and conceded only six goals across that run. Scottish teams have still never won away to a North Macedonian club, drawing three and losing one of the four previous matches, stretching back to Yugoslavia times.

History is largely on Hibs’ side from this position, though. They have progressed after four of their five previous one-goal home first-leg wins, with the only failure coming against Liverpool in 1975. Hibs defeated one of the best sides in Europe 1-0 in the UEFA Cup at Easter Road after Joe Harper scored the game’s only goal, but then lost the return leg 3-1 at Anfield, thanks to a John Toshack hat-trick. Liverpool would go on to win the tournament that season, and many others in the subsequent years…

Motherwell Vs HJK (19:30)

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HJK Vs Motherwell
(Bolt Arena, Thursday 17:00)

Motherwell’s trip to Helsinki is a proper step up after their comfortable 5-0 aggregate win over HB. Alfred Johansson’s side won 2-0 at Fir Park and 3-0 in the Faroe Islands, ending a run of six successive two-legged European exits and winning both legs of a tie for only the third time in the club’s history.

The clean sheets also give Motherwell a couple of records to chase. This is only the second time they have kept back-to-back shutouts in Europe, while the win in Tórshavn ended a nine-match winless run away from home stretching back to 2010.

Motherwell have never kept three consecutive European clean sheets or won successive away matches in their entire European history.

HJK should provide a much tougher test. The Finnish side beat Coleraine 8-0 on aggregate in the last round and have lost only one of their last ten European home matches, winning five and scoring 21 goals. They are also well into their domestic season, while Motherwell’s Premiership campaign does not begin until Saturday.

Motherwell’s only previous Finnish tie ended in one of the crueller exits in their history. They lost 3-1 at home to MYPA in 1995, won 2-0 in Finland but still went out on away goals. Scottish clubs have generally fared well against Finnish sides, with 14 wins, five draws and only three defeats from 22 matches, although Aberdeen drew both games against HJK in the Conference League group stage in 2023.

The reward for the winners is a Conference League play-off against Bundesliga side Freiburg, an incredibly tough ask and one of the hardest possible draws. Motherwell must first find a way past HJK, beginning with Thursday’s QR3 first leg in Helsinki.

Jagiellonia Białystok Vs Rangers
(Chorten Arena, Thursday 17:00)

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The national coefficient is now so low that it will take at least two or three years of consistently strong results before Scotland can meaningfully improve its position. Even getting back to this summer’s entry points will require several clubs to reach, and then properly compete in, the league phases year after year. There is more detail on the coefficient picture in last week’s weekly review.

Before today’s draw, I raised the concern that - for the first time since it was introduced - UEFA did not evenly distribute the top sides in the pre-draw groupings.

The top five leagues normally enter one side in the Conference League play-off round, unless their domestic allocation is affected by a European title-holder place. That happened in 2021/22, when Spain had no Conference League entrant after Villarreal won the Europa League and entered the Champions League as title holders.

In each of the previous five seasons, UEFA had evenly spread those four or five clubs across the four pre-draw groups, giving seeded teams a broadly equal chance of drawing one of the tournament favourites.

This year, though, UEFA placed two top-league sides in Group 1 and two in Group 2, with none in Groups 3 or 4. The fifth side from the top five leagues, Getafe, were unseeded in Group 4, so they could not be paired with another team from the top four leagues….

So, when Hearts, Hibs and Motherwell were all put in the first two groups, we had fairly high odds of seeing Scottish teams being paired with some of the tournament favourites.

As it was, only Motherwell were handed that unfortunate slice of luck, drawing last year’s Europa League finalists Freiburg. The rest of Scotland’s Conference League sides got away with it and can be fairly happy with the draw, given the other options.

This article will now show the latest “route to the league phase” graphic, mapping out each team’s path through qualifiers, before a brief summation of the opponents.

The Route to the League Phase

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As in previous years, I have produce an ‘away travel guide’ for each Scottish club. For each of the potential opponents I include the expected:

• stadium and capacity

• away allocation

• nearest airports accessible from Scotland

• example fares

In this round, this early flight information is only really helpful for Celtic fans - as they are the only one of the four that don’t enter in QR3, and so they are the only side that know for definite they will play in this tie. The other four won’t know if they will either still be in Europe after QR3 (Motherwell and Hibs) or which tournament they’ll be in after QR3 (Hearts and Rangers).

Conference League Shambles

For the first time, UEFA have not evenly spread clubs from the top 5 leagues across the pre-draw Conference League groups.

Teams in groups 3 or 4 therefore cannot draw a seeded top-five league club in today’s draw!

Of course, Hearts, Motherwell and Hibs are all in the first two groups and so can all be paired with a club from the top five leagues. This seems very unfair for the unseeded teams in group 1 and 2, and I believe UEFA should have worked harder to overcome whichever country restrictions were preventing an even spread in their chosen outcome.

Celtic

Date of away leg is not yet known. I have provided examples of the cheapest flight options across the available dates - this might not be the actual date of the game.

Celtic will play one of the below five sets of teams in the Champions League play-off. The draw is today at 11am.

Hearts

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The play-off round draws take place tomorrow, setting out the final hurdle before the league phase. The Champions League draw begins at 11am, followed by the Europa League at noon and the Conference League at 1pm.

All five Scottish clubs remain in Europe. Four play the first legs of their third qualifying round ties on Thursday: Rangers and Motherwell at 5pm, with Hearts and Hibs kicking off at 8pm.

Because the play-off draw happens before those ties are played, tomorrow’s draw will ensure each side will already know who awaits them in every possible scenario.

Celtic
(seeded)

Celtic are one of the seeded entrants in the Champions League’s Champions Path. There are no morning groupings to narrow down potential opponents, and so all five of the unseeded options below will be the possibilities for Celtic.

This is a fairly favourable set of potential opponents and Celtic should progress against any of them - especially now AEK Athens have moved to the seeded side. Avoiding trips to either Kairat or Sabah would be preferable.

Hearts

Hearts’ Europa League third qualifying round tie couldn’t be harder, drawn against the highest ranked team in qualifiers, Benfica. Tomorrow’s draw sets out both of their possible paths - Europa League play-off if they progress past Benfica, Conference League play-off if they don’t.

Europa League - (seeded)

For Hearts, they would be on the seeded side of the Europa League play-off round should they progress past Benfica, and as such there are 12 sets of potential opponents.

These are made up of teams that enter in this round, teams that will progress from QR3 and teams that will drop down from Champions League QR3. The 12 teams will be narrowed down to four at 07:30am tomorrow morning.

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Motherwell’s tie against Faroese side HB looked straightforward after their 2-0 first-leg win, and a 3-0 victory in Tórshavn completed a 5-0 aggregate success. Hibs faced far greater uncertainty after last week’s disaster in Kosovo. Three goals in the opening 35 minutes eased the Easter Road nerves, although the closing stages became tense after Malisheva made it 4-1 on the night and 4-3 on aggregate with six minutes plus stoppage time remaining.

Hibs became only the second Scottish club, after Celtic, to progress from more than one European tie after losing the first leg by at least two goals.

Hearts dropped out of the Champions League without scoring across the two legs. The 6-0 aggregate scoreline felt harsh given the chances the Jambos created over the course of the tie but ultimately it was a wasted entry into the Champions League after 20 years away.

They now drop into the third qualifying round of the Europa League, where they will face Benfica. The Portuguese side showed their class in their own second leg against St Gallen, winning 5-0 on the night and 6-2 on aggregate. Greek striker Vangelis Pavlidis scored the first four goals, less than a year after pleasingly missing a sitter for Greece against Scotland at Hampden. We might not have made the World Cup had he scored.

If Hearts lose that tie, they will drop into the Conference League play-off round as an unseeded team. Their potential opponents will be confirmed in Monday’s draw, so we desperately need a favourable tie for Hearts.

The Coefficient Standings

Motherwell remain Scotland’s leading contributors this season after winning both legs without conceding a goal. Hibs recovered from last week’s embarrassment to become the first Edinburgh club to add points to Scotland’s coefficient.

Despite those wins, Scotland’s position in the UEFA rankings remains abysmal. The next three to five years will be shaped by how many Scottish clubs reach the league phase this season and next.

The target this season is to get four of the five clubs into the league phase, which would be a Scottish first - we’ve never had more than three. If Scotland reaches that figure and our clubs collect wins across the three competitions, the national coefficient can begin a slow climb back towards 15th. That is the position required to retain the current entry points for our clubs.

Scotland’s entry rounds will worsen dramatically over the next few seasons. This starts from next summer, as the clubs will enter as follows:

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Motherwell are the only one of the three playing away, but a 2-0 home win should give them confidence before their Conference League second qualifying round return in the Faroe Islands.

Hibs bring their Kosovan opponents back to Easter Road after an embarrassing 2-0 defeat last week. They are hoping to produce only the 11th occasion on which a Scottish club has overturned a first-leg deficit of two or more goals in Europe.

Hearts are up first though, and they have an almost impossible task after losing the first leg in Austria 4-0. However this article will still show that it is possible to progress from this seemingly helpless situation.

This article will look at the best ever European comebacks, before focusing only on the Scottish comebacks. It ends with a plea for Motherwell to not become the 14th Scottish side to blow a first leg 2 goal victory to then be eliminated.

Hearts - After Losing a 1st Leg By 4+

Hearts had faced four previous European ties in which they lost the first leg by at least four goals. They failed to progress from all four, although they were unbeaten in each return match. That run includes a 0-0 draw at White Hart Lane against Tottenham Hotspur in 2011, when a young Harry Kane had a penalty saved.

Hibs - After Losing a 1st Leg By 2+

Hibs have now lost the first leg of a European tie by two or more goals on 12 occasions, progressing only once. That famous comeback against Napoli is covered in more detail below.

The closest they have come to repeating it was against AEK Athens 25 years ago. Hibs took the Greek giants to extra time at Easter Road before being eliminated 4-3 on aggregate.

The Best European Comebacks

The graphic below includes every occasion on which a European club progressed after losing the first leg by four goals.

It also includes teams that fell four goals behind at another stage of the tie. That covers clubs who lost the first leg by three before conceding first in the return, along with teams who trailed by four during the first leg before reducing the deficit before full time.

Only six clubs have progressed after losing the first leg by four goals in the history of men's European club competition.

Including every recovery from four goals behind at any stage of a tie adds another seven, giving us 13 four-goal comebacks. One of them is almost certainly the greatest ever Scottish comeback in European football:

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Deciding whether one result was “worse” than another is highly subjective. There are so many factors to consider: the respective budgets, the venue, the pitch, the weather, how recently the manager or players arrived, and that is before looking at anything relating to the opposition. The margin of defeat matters too, as does the aggregate score. If a team recovers to progress, the damage is clearly less severe than a defeat which ends its European campaign.

As a one-off match, Celtic losing to Lincoln Red Imps would take some beating, given the vast difference in stature and budget between the clubs. However, the result did not cost Celtic the tie because they recovered in the second leg at Celtic Park. Hopefully we can say the same about Hibs if they pull off a rare two-goal turnaround.

There will be more on those two-goal European comebacks in an article next week.

For now, though, the result stings for Hibs fans and coefficientistas alike.

Once aggregate scores and the wider context of each tie are considered, Rangers’ defeat by Luxembourg’s Progrès Niederkorn is probably the worst of the lot. It brought complete European elimination for one of Scotland’s most storied clubs, even though Progrès had a higher ClubElo rating than Lincoln Red Imps.

I wanted a consistent way to categorise these defeats, so I used the independent rating system at ClubElo.com. For every European match lost by a Scottish club, I took the opposition’s ClubElo rating immediately before the game. The lower the opponent’s rating, the worse the defeat is.

ClubElo gives every club a rating designed to reflect its strength at that point in time: the higher the number, the stronger the team. Ratings change after each match, with unexpected results producing the biggest movement. Beating a highly rated opponent earns more points than beating a weaker one, while losing to a low-rated side causes a larger drop. The system also considers home advantage, the winning margin and differences between domestic leagues. For these lists, I have used each opponent’s rating immediately before the match.

On that basis, and disregarding every other factor, including the aggregate score, Malisheva’s 2-0 victory over Hibernian is the eighth-worst result ever suffered by a Scottish club in Europe. If Hibs turn the tie around next week, five of the ten “worst results” on the above list will still have seen the Scottish club progress to the next round.

The Top 20 Worst Results -
Removing the Old-Firm

Before moving on to the best results, we can have a collective bout of PTSD while recalling some of these horror shows.

These are the 20 worst defeats suffered by non-Old Firm clubs, based solely on the ClubElo rating of the opposition.

Motherwell Flying The Flag

It was a poor week for Scotland’s coefficient, that we won’t dwell on anymore and instead will look at the only positive - Motherwell ended it with an encouraging 2-0 win over Faroese side HB.

Five summer signings made their competitive debuts, while 19-year-old academy graduate Mikey Booth also made his first team debut. The newly assembled side got the job done under new manager Alfred Johansson, helped by a rare combination of goals - two from outside the box.

Martin Moormann and Lukas Fadinger both scored from range, something Scottish clubs have rarely managed twice in the same European match.

From the beginning of the 2001/02 season until Wednesday, Scottish clubs have played 733 matches, with the Scottish side scoring at least twice in 257 of them.

My European database contains every match result in UEFA history, and extensive scorer and line-up coverage, but my “goal-type” data is more limited. Of those 250 matches where Scottish teams scored at least twice, I have ‘inside-or-outside-the-box’ information for 132 of the games.

Celtic managed it three times from the matches I have, most recently nearly a decade ago in a Champions League play-off against Hapoel Beer-Sheva. Tom Rogic opened the scoring from the edge of the box, with the goalkeeper stranded, before Leigh Griffiths curled in a free-kick from near the corner of the penalty area.

Prior to that, Celtic drew 2-2 away to RB Salzbug in 2014, with both Scott Brown and debutant Wakaso Mubarak (who?) scoring from outside the box, as seen in these highlights kindly supplied by Doug who is a podcaster and friend of the page.

The most famous example for Celtic I have is the 2-0 Quarter-Final win against Liverpool at Anfield, en route to the UEFA Cup Final in 2003. Alan Thompson scored a free kick before John Hartson sealed the win from range.

More recently, one of the highlights of Russell Martin’s time at Rangers was the 2-0 home win over Panathinaikos. Findlay Curtis and Djeidi Gassama both scored from distance to give Rangers a healthy lead to take to Greece, where a 1-1 draw carried them safely into the next round.

Hibs are the other team I have a record of doing so - and they did it twice in a week in July 2018. The Hibees scored six in each leg against Faroese minnows
Runavík, with Oli Shaw and debutant Stevie Mallan scoring outside the box in the first leg - before Mallan did it twice more in the away leg 7 days later.

Minutes 2:51 and 5:56 for Mallan’s two in the Faroe Islands:

Update after publication:
Did some more digging to increase the scope of 2+ goals outside the box, and got to 13 games

Back to 2026, and Motherwell’s victory added 0.2 points to Scotland’s coefficient in a season when we should be aiming for at least 10 points to begin closing the vast gap above us. Hopefully Motherwell win the second leg and progress, giving them another two matches to try and add more points to Scotland’s total.

For this season’s graphics, I will unfortunately no longer be tracking from 10th-15th and instead will be monitoring from 15th down to 23rd! We are nearly 8 points (20 league phase wins) behind Cyprus in 15th and so we won’t be rejoining the top 15 this season.

We will need bumper points tallies this season and next to get anywhere near that threshold - which would only get us back to the current European entry points of this summer.

Our drop outside the top 15 will kick in this time next year, and that’s when the entry points get really bad.

The Best Results In History

The following section will show the

• Top 100 best European results from non-Old Firm sides

• The top 10 non-Old Firm wins this century

• The top 20 Old Firm wins & Old Firm Losses

First, here are the ten best European results achieved by non-Old Firm Scottish clubs. As with the worst defeats, the list is compiled solely using the ClubElo rating of the opposition immediately before each match.

Aberdeen beating Real Madrid to win a European trophy is clearly the greatest result outside of the Old Firm. Using ClubElo rating’s only though, their quarter-final victory over Bayern Munich ranks higher because Bayern had a stronger Elo rating at the time.

ClubElo ratings update after every match. For example, when Dundee United beat Barcelona at Tannadice, the result caused Barcelona’s Elo rating to fall. That means the return victory at the Camp Nou two weeks later, which is clearly more impressive, actually ranks lower because Barcelona entered the second leg with a reduced rating. The away victory sits just outside the top ten.

I shared this graphic on social media and was inundated with messages and comments asking where other famous results would rank. For this reason, the next section shows the top 100 non-Old Firm European victories across ten graphics, allowing you to find almost every great result you might have had in mind.

Before that, here is compelling evidence of how far Scottish football has fallen: only 11 of the top 100 best results have come since 2000! The other 89 all came during the first four decades of Scottish participation in European football.

Best Non-Old Firm Results Since 2000

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This article was written for Scottishfootball.info by Josh Duncan, an aspiring sports writer, who has his own Substack account. Please follow him there and on X.com.

Josh’s latest article is a tactical analysis of Hearts’ opponents, Sturm Graz.

Hearts and their supporters head off to Austria’s second largest city tomorrow, to face Austria’s second best team (of last season), Sturm Graz. With Wouter Vrancken getting his first taste of competitive football as Hearts manager. The match is live on Premier Sports on Tuesday evening, with a 7:30pm kick off.

Sturm Graz have a rich European history but struggled in UEFA competition last year. They were brushed aside by Bodø/Glimt in Champions League qualifiers before finishing 26th in the Europa League.

Despite their poor European form last season, Graz will be a tough test for Hearts. A new manager and major squad changes will have made preparation for this tie difficult. Time will tell if the new ideas have been embedded well enough to survive the trip to Austria.

It’s not clear how Sturm Graz will adapt their play to European games. Fabio Ingolitsch took over the team in January and only led the team for two European matches.

In domestic play, the 5-time Austrian champions opt for a 3-4-1-2 formation on paper. The way they use that formation depends on the game situation. I’d like to look at a few different options that Sturm take and how Hearts may get some joy against them.

Despite being naturally ball dominant in their domestic play, Sturm are comfortable without it. They use counter movements to create direct attacking opportunities.

The midfielders drop to receive the ball and the frontline moves in behind to stretch the game. This gives space to fight for a long ball, if they don’t win straight away, Sturm will then counter press to win the ball back high.

Those dropping midfielders aren’t just decoys though, Sturm will try to play through the middle when they create the space for it.

The left wing back drops in early to make a back four, which stretches the opposition press. When they trigger the press it leaves space down either side of the deepest midfielder, usually Stankovic, for the more advanced midfielders to receive in.

Sturm are happiest when teams want to press them, they have multiple solutions to this problem. They can play through the middle like that or make the distances big and go direct into these spaces. Below is another example of this.

The Sturm midfield is very physical but not incredible under pressure. I think Hearts can get to them and create opportunities when Sturm play through the middle.

If Hearts can get on to the midfield quickly then they can force errors and win the ball back high up the pitch. This could be one of their best ways to create in the away leg, where Sturm might be more expansive in their play. Below are a couple of examples of Salzburg doing this towards the end of last season.

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1. Drawn against a beatable team

2. Have the second leg at home

3. Opposition’s coefficient for the next round

4. How hard/expensive the away game is for the fans.

This article will summarise today’s draw for each of the four Scottish sides, with the above in mind, with a recap of the prize money on the line for each club at each stage.

First though, a graphic laying out the routes through the league phase for all five Scottish teams:

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As in previous years, I have produce an ‘away travel guide’ for each Scottish club. For each of the potential opponents I include the expected:

• stadium and capacity

• away allocation

• nearest airports accessible from Scotland

• example fares

In this round, this early flight information is only really helpful for Rangers fans - as they are the only one of the four that don’t enter in QR2, and so they are the only side that know for definite they will play in this tie. The other three won’t know if they will either still be in Europe after QR2 (Motherwell and Hibs) or which tournament they’ll be in after QR2 (Hearts).

Hearts

Champions League

Europa League

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The third qualifying round draws for UEFA’s three competitions take place this Monday, the morning after the World Cup Final. The Champions League draw is first at 11am, followed by Europa League at 12pm and Conference League at 1pm.

Now that the first qualifying round has completed, we can say for certain which teams will be in the draw, and the club coefficient required to be above the ‘seeding line’ in each of the three tournaments.

This has resulted in some minor changes in the list of possible opponents for the Scottish sides, while also providing slightly more clarity by removing some other sides that have now been eliminated.

On Monday morning I will put out another article, following UEFA releasing the final groupings for each team. This will include the capacity of each stadium, expected away allocation, and best possible flights to book for each potential opponent.

Celtic (seeded)

As explained in the original article, Celtic are not in this draw, and there has been no change in their potential opponents for the playoff round draw. However they will take interest in the results of second qualifying round, as the ‘seeded line’ could still move - pushing AEK Athens into the seeded half and so removing them as a possible opponent.

Hearts (unseeded)

Hearts will be in the first two draws, both the Champions League and Europa League. There has been no change in their potential opponents in the Champions League, but their Europa League opponents have changed slightly.

Champions League

These are the only four opponents Hearts can face, and they will not be narrowed down by groupings on the morning of the draw.

Europa League

These are the only five opponents Hearts can face, and they will be narrowed down to either three or four on the morning of the draw.

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The key thing to remember throughout qualifying is that the next-round draw takes place before the current round has been played. For this, UEFA uses the club with the higher coefficient in the draw for the next round.

For drop-down places into a lower competition, the lower coefficient is used. That can be damaging to a high-ranking side like Rangers, should they suffer an unexpected defeat. That’s because when they drop down they could inherit an unseeded spot in the lower competition, depending on who beats them.

Conversely, it can also help low-ranking Scottish teams like Motherwell, if they were to beat higher-ranked opponents. Depending on who they eliminate, they may then inherit a seeded place for the next round.

The first qualifying round of UEFA club competition has not even been played yet, never mind the second qualifying round, which will involve three Scottish sides. But we can already plan for the third-round draw, which takes place on Monday 20 July, a few days before the first legs of the second round.

Celtic are the only Scottish side who will not be involved in the third-round draw, as they enter in the play-off round as a seeded team. That’s not to say they have no interest in it though, as some underdogs progressing in the earlier rounds could still help Celtic, by changing the seeding line and potentially giving them a more favourable play-off tie. We already know some of the Hoops’ potential opponents, although the final seeding line and the teams involved are subject to the next few weeks of qualifiers.

Like Celtic, AEK Athens, LASK and Viking all enter in the play-off round, so they will definitely be in the draw. However, which teams progress from rounds 1 and 2 will determine which other teams make it into the play-off round draw.

As it stands, based on coefficient, this will be the winners of the ties involving Celje of Slovenia and Omonia Nicosia of Cyprus. If there are upsets in the earlier rounds, then these teams will differ, and the seeding line may also change. For example, if a higher-ranked team is eliminated in the earlier rounds, AEK Athens may move from the unseeded side to the seeded side of the draw, and would no longer be a possible opponent for Celtic. This graphic will be updated for Celtic after the second round has taken place, and before the draw on Monday 3 August.

The Third Round Draws

For all potential opponents listed for the Europa League and Conference League below, not all teams are locked into their respective halves of the draw. These will be set after the second legs are completed in QR1.

If there is an upset in QR1, then the seedings could change slightly. For example, the winner of the Europa League tie involving Maccabi Tel Aviv could end up being a seeded team, and therefore it would be Hearts, rather than Rangers, who may be paired with them. The graphics are all as it stands, so the winner of Maccabi Tel Aviv’s tie is shown as a potential opponent on the Rangers graphic for now.

Hearts

Last year’s runners-up enter in Champions League QR2, so they will be involved in two draws on Monday 20 July: the Champions League QR3 draw and the Europa League QR3 draw. The result of their tie against Sturm Graz decides whether they will play in the Champions League or Europa League third qualifying round.

Hearts will be in both the Champions League and Europa League draws, so in advance of the Sturm Graz tie they will know their next opponents whether they win or lose.

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The draws begin next week, with the QR1 draw on Tuesday 16 June and the QR2 draw the following day, on Wednesday 17 June.

Both Motherwell and Hibs will be in Wednesday’s draw, but on opposite sides of the QR2 seeding line. This is based on club coefficient, not on where they finished in the Scottish Premiership last season.

Motherwell’s five-year club coefficient is 1.500, which is lower than 20% of Scotland’s association coefficient (6.41). That means Motherwell use the higher figure, 6.41, for seeding purposes. Hibernian’s own five-year club coefficient is 7.0, which is higher than 20% of Scotland’s coefficient, so Hibs use their own coefficient.

Being seeded in QR2 is an obvious advantage for Hibs, as it should give them a more favourable tie than Motherwell. The trade off is that Hibs would be guaranteed to be unseeded in QR3 if they progress, whereas Motherwell could be seeded.

Motherwell’s position is slightly more complicated. They will definitely be unseeded in QR2, but could end up on the seeded side of the QR3 draw depending on who they eliminate. That is explained in more detail in the QR3 section below.

Qualifying Round Two (QR2)

The graphics below show the potential QR2 opponents for both Scottish clubs, as well as the prize money at stake for progression or elimination.

Teams listed without a letter after their name enter the competition in QR2, so they are confirmed as potential opponents.

Where a team has a W or L after their name, it means they enter in an earlier round in either the Europa League or the Conference League. For example, the QR2 draw may contain “winner of RFS v team X” rather than simply RFS - because RFS have a Conference QR1 tie to win first.

Similarly the “loser of the tie involving Vojvodina” assumes that Vojvodina lose their Europa League QR1 tie, but they could win this and so it would be the team that they beat that features as a Conference League QR2 opponent for Hibs instead. The missing potential opponent in those cases will be known after the QR1 draw, which takes place next Tuesday, the day before the QR2 draw

Motherwell - QR2

Unseeded Motherwell’s list of potential seeded opponents, that will be narrowed down to five teams next Wednesday. For each tie, the first team drawn is at home in the first leg - seeding doesn’t matter.

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The BBC screened the final live in 1994, but in every other season from 1992/93 until 2015 it was free on ITV, before BT Sport, and latterly TNT Sports, continued making it free for the next decade. Now, the cheapest legal UK access is via an HBO Max subscription, which starts at £4.99 per month. HBO Max is available at no extra cost to Sky Sports subscribers.

A paywalled final is likely to be the case next season too, as 2026/27 is the final season of TNT Sports’ current UK rights cycle. From 2027/28, Paramount+ has the rights to the Champions League, while the Europa League and Conference League will move to Sky Sports. It remains to be seen whether they will continue TNT’s paywalling of the finals or revert to making them free to all.

If Arsenal win the trophy, it will be back-to-back new winners of the Champions League, something that has not happened since 1993. It would also be just the seventh such streak in the history of Europe’s top club competition.

Three English Winners

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As someone who runs a website passionately supporting Scottish teams in Europe, I do not particularly enjoy being reminded of his previous honour: the 2022 Europa League final victory on penalties in Seville, after a 1-1 draw with Rangers.

Before Glasner, Palace had never won a major trophy in their 120-year history. He leaves the club having secured three pieces of silverware in 12 months: the FA Cup, Community Shield and Conference League. A high calibre out-of-work manager. I wonder if he fancies a job in Scotland…

Debut Season Winners

Crystal Palace won the Conference League at the first attempt, joining a prestigious list of 12 clubs. That list includes Celtic, who won the European Cup at the first time of asking in 1967.

Prior to the introduction of the Conference League in 2021, only seven clubs had ever won a UEFA competition in their first season in that tournament.

What makes Palace’s victory so unique, is they are not just winning the trophy after their first season in the Conference League, it’s their first ever season in UEFA competition. They join a select group of eight* clubs to have achieved that feat, and the first since KV Mechelen in 1988.

Even reaching a final in a first European campaign is rare. Palace are the first since Alavés in 2001 and just the 15th club ever to do so.

Consecutive New Winners

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Best Case Scenarios

Celtic

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The longest article ever written for the website was published last week; “The UEFA qualifiers” covers all the details for all Scottish teams.

This is the fifth of five qualification articles this week, covering everything you could possibly want to know about Hibs in Europe:

• Entry point and overall route through qualifiers

• Potential opponents lying in wait in the qualifiers

• ‘Best’ and ‘worst’ routes through qualifiers

• Minimum earnings depending on stage of elimination.

• Potential league phase opponents

• Next summer’s much worse entry points

Qualifying Stat: Hibernian have won 7/14 ‘qualifying’ ties in UEFA competition across 7 separate seasons in their history - all since 2010.

Hibernian’s Entry Point

Hibs have finished fifth in the league for the third time this century, meaning they will have European football in consecutive seasons for the 10th time in their history, and the first since 2006.

That includes the Intertoto Cup, so if we exclude that then this will be the first time Hibs have played in major European competition in back-to-back seasons since the 1970s, when they had their best period of five consecutive seasons between 1972 and 1977.

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The longest article ever written for the website was published last week; “The UEFA qualifiers” covers all the details for all Scottish teams.

This is the fourth of five articles this week, covering everything you could possibly want to know about Motherwell in Europe:

• Entry point and overall route through qualifiers

• Potential opponents lying in wait in the qualifiers

• ‘Best’ and ‘worst’ routes through qualifiers

• Minimum earnings depending on stage of elimination.

• Potential league phase opponents

• Next summer’s much worse entry points

Qualifying Stat: Motherwell have won 7/16 ‘qualifying’ ties in UEFA competition across 9 separate seasons in their history.

Motherwell’s Entry Point

Motherwell have finished fourth in the league for the first time this century, meaning European football will return to Fir Park after a four year absence.

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A Dunfermline win in the Scottish Cup final tomorrow (Saturday) would earn the Pars Scotland’s third European entry point - the third qualifying round of the Europa League. A Celtic victory would hand that entry point to Rangers, and also reward Hibs with Scotland’s fifth European spot.

If Dunfermline win the Scottish Cup, Hibs miss out on Europe and Rangers enter Conference League qualifying.

There are so many permutations for our clubs in Europe this summer. Scotland could end up with as many as four clubs in the Conference League phase at the same time. It’s unlikely, but we could also have two in the Champions League. Three in the Europa League is also possible, and arguably the optimum outcome from a coefficient-points perspective.

The longest article ever written for the website was published last week; “The UEFA qualifiers” covers all the details for all Scottish teams.

This is the third of five articles this week, covering everything you could possibly want to know about Rangers in Europe:

• Entry point and overall route through qualifiers

• Potential opponents lying in wait in the qualifiers

• ‘Best’ and ‘worst’ routes through qualifiers

• Minimum earnings in each competition

• Potential league phase opponents

• Next summer’s much worse entry points

Qualifying Stat: Rangers have won of 39/51 ‘qualifying’ ties in UEFA competition across 31 separate seasons in their history. Excluding clubs with two or fewer qualifying ties, Rangers have the best qualifying-tie win percentage in the country: 76.5%, ahead of Celtic on 75.9% and Kilmarnock on 60%.

Rangers’ Entry Point

Rangers have finished third in the league for the fourth time since 2015, including in the Championship, meaning there will be no Champions League football next season.

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