A couple of weeks ago, I was counting out West Ham United's chances to make it into the UEFA Europa League next year. If you don't follow soccer/football but you do follow this blog and therefore you wonder what that is, it's the second-tier club tournament in Europe (as the UEFA Champions League is the top tier).
So I thought that in the Premier League the top four qualify for the Champions League, and the fifth-place team
goes to the Europa League, and that's it. So I was right about the Champions League top-four rule, but it turns out
there's an exception. If the winner of the FA Cup (and a couple of other cups) is in the top five, then the
sixth-place PL team also qualifies for the Europa League. And that would have happened if either Chelsea or
Leicester City made it into the Champions League (which it turns out was Chelsea, who lost on the last day, but
Leicester City lost as well, to Tottenham Hotspur, so Chelsea exceeded them by a point).
So the Hammers are in the Europa League. The PL commentators, notably ex-USA goalkeeper Tim Howard, said that
for them to be successful next year, they're going to have to increase team depth, because the grind of playing
both PL and Europa Cup (and the other cups, FA, Carabao) can wear down a team over the full season.
So they've got their chance. Now, how do they make the most of it?
At least for next season, I'll probably follow both Crystal Palace and West Ham.
A note: last season, the Spurs got into the Europa League because Manchester City won the EFL Cup, also known
as the Carabao Cup.
From Wikipedia: "Since the winners of the 2019–20 EFL Cup, Manchester City, qualified for
the Champions League group stage by league position, the spot given to the EFL Cup winners
(Europa League second qualifying round) was passed down to the sixth-placed team."
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