Dan Lawless of West Ham Fan TV has slammed footage to have emerged on Sky Sports on a potential revamp of the Champions League.
West Ham fans will be in absolute dreamland after they saw their side win convincingly 3-0 away to Lyon and advance into the Europa League semi-finals with a 4-1 win on aggregate, setting up a tie against Eintracht Frankfurt.
Will West Ham win the Europa League?
Yes!
No!
The winner of the Europa League gets a spot in next season’s Champions League, and given that West Ham are now six points off the top four having also played more games than teams above them, winning this competition looks to be their best route into Europe’s elite competition.
However, in a few years’ time, the way teams go about getting into the Champions League could be about to change as UEFA are set to offer two wildcard spots in the tournament for teams that finish outside of the traditional qualification places, but only those who have a historical background in the competition, making it easier for the bigger clubs to always be in the Champions League.
This hasn’t gone down well, especially with Lawless who took to Twitter to say: “Killing the Prem with this nonsense. Where are the protests and outrage like there were for the Super League? This is basically what it is. Arsenal and Spurs have never won the Champions League, Man Utd have done nothing in it for 10 years yet they get a free pass.”
TIF Thoughts on this decision by UEFA…
It’s no surprise that Lawless is fuming as many other fans of West Ham will be, as their UEFA coefficient ranking would likely only be 90, just four places above Newcastle United – who haven’t featured in Europe since 2013, which doesn’t seem right at all.
Then, when you also look at who else is above them, the likes of Arsenal and Tottenham Hotspur have had limited European success over the last few years, with the Gunners not even qualifying for any European competition this season, whereas the Hammers are in a semi-final, which makes Lawless’ point even more clear and correct that this seems like a slightly different version of the European Super League which was shut down almost immediately last year.
In other news: David Moyes surely angry as footage of 32 y/o West Ham ace emerges – opinion