2023–24 UEFA Europa Conference League

2023–24 UEFA Europa Conference League
The 2023–24 UEFA Europa Conference League is the third season of the UEFA Europa Conference League, Europe's tertiary club football tournament organised by UEFA.
The final will be played at the Agia Sophia Stadium in Athens, Greece. The winners of the tournament will automatically qualify for the 2024–25 UEFA Europa League league stage, unless they qualify for the 2024–25 UEFA Champions League through their league performance.
This edition will be the final season with the current format of 32 teams participating at the group stage, after UEFA announced that a brand new format would be introduced for the following edition. Due to the change, no clubs can be transferred from the Europa League group stage to the UEFA Europa Conference League under the Swiss format, and this edition's winners onwards will no longer be able to defend their title. This will also be the final season under its current name as it is renamed as the UEFA Conference League from the 2024–25 season onwards. According to UEFA, the new denomination of the competition will enable further development as a stand-alone competition in their research amongst fans and commercial partners.
As the title holders, West Ham United have qualified for the 2023–24 UEFA Europa League.
Association team allocation
A total of 178 teams from 54 of the 55 UEFA member associations (excluding Russia) will participate in the 2023–24 UEFA Europa Conference League. The association ranking based on the UEFA country coefficients is used to determine the number of participating teams for each association:
Associations 1–5 each have one team qualify.
Associations 6–16 (except Russia) and 51–55 each have two teams qualify.
Associations 17–50 (except Liechtenstein) each have three teams qualify.
Liechtenstein has only one team that qualifies as they organize only a domestic cup and no domestic league.
Moreover, 18 teams eliminated from the 2023–24 UEFA Champions League and 25 teams eliminated from the 2023–24 UEFA Europa League are transferred to the Europa Conference League.
Association ranking
For the 2023–24 UEFA Europa Conference League, the associations are allocated places according to their 2022 UEFA country coefficients, which takes into account their performance in European competitions from 2017–18 to 2021–22.
Apart from the allocation based on the country coefficients, associations may have additional teams participating in the Europa Conference League, as noted below:
– Additional teams transferred from the UEFA Champions League
– Additional teams transferred from the UEFA Europa League
Distribution
The following is the access list for this season.
Due to the suspension of Russia for the 2023–24 European season, the following changes to the access list have been made:
The cup winners of association 16 (Czech Republic) enter the Europa League third qualifying round instead of the second qualifying round.
The cup winners of associations 17 to 19 (Norway, Denmark and Croatia) enter the third qualifying round instead of the second qualifying round.
The cup winners of associations 30 to 39 (Slovakia, Slovenia, Belarus, Moldova, Lithuania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Finland, Luxembourg, Latvia and Kosovo) enter the second qualifying round instead of the first qualifying round.
Combining with the Champions League title holder (Manchester City) qualifying for the Champions League group stage via their domestic league, the following changes to the access list have been made:
Two of the Champions League first qualifying round losers receive byes and enter the third qualifying round instead of the second qualifying round.
Teams
The labels in the parentheses show how each team qualified for the place of its starting round:
The labels in the parentheses show how each team qualified for the place of its starting round:
CW: Domestic cup winners
2nd, 3rd, 4th, 5th, 6th, etc.: League position of the previous season
LC: League cup winners
RW: Regular season winners
PW: End-of-season Europa Conference League play-offs winners
UCL: Transferred from the Champions League
Q1: Losers from the first qualifying round
PR: Losers from the preliminary round (F: final; SF: semi-finals)
UEL: Transferred from the Europa League
GS: Third-placed teams from the group stage
PO: Losers from the play-off round
CH/MP Q3: Losers from the third qualifying round (Champions/Main Path)
The second qualifying round, third qualifying round and play-off round are divided into Champions Path (CH) and Main Path (MP).
CC: 2023 UEFA club coefficients.
One team not playing in a national top division will take part in the competition: Vaduz (2nd tier).
Notes
Schedule
The schedule of the competition is as follows. Matches are scheduled for Thursdays apart from the final, which takes place on a Wednesday, though exceptionally can take place on Tuesdays or Wednesdays due to scheduling conflicts.
Qualifying rounds
First qualifying round
Second qualifying round
Third qualifying round
Play-off round
Group stage
The draw for the group stage was held on 1 September 2023, 14:30 CEST, in Monaco. The 32 teams were drawn into eight groups of four. For the draw, the teams were seeded into four pots, each of eight teams, based on their Club coefficients (CC). Teams from the same association could not be drawn into the same group.
All teams besides AZ, Ballkani, Bodø/Glimt, Fiorentina, Gent, HJK, Maccabi Tel Aviv, PAOK, Slovan Bratislava and Zorya Luhansk made their debut appearances in the group stage. Breiðablik, Čukarički, KÍ, Olimpija Ljubljana and Zrinjski Mostar all made their debut appearances in a UEFA competition group stage. Breiðablik, KÍ and Zrinjski Mostar were the first teams from Iceland, the Faroe Islands and Bosnia and Herzegovina, respectively, to play in a UEFA competition group stage. Breiðablik also became the first ever team to qualify for the group stages of a UEFA club competition after starting in a preliminary round.
A total of 28 national associations were represented in the group stage.
Group A
Group B
Group C
Group D
Group E
Group F
Group G
Group H
Final
Statistics
Statistics exclude qualifying rounds and play-off round.
Tables updated as of 26 October 2023.
Top goalscorers
Top assists
See also
2023–24 UEFA Champions League
2023–24 UEFA Europa League
2024 UEFA Super Cup
2023–24 UEFA Women's Champions League
2023–24 UEFA Youth League
References
External links
3
2023–24
Current association football seasons
Sports events affected by the Russian invasion of Ukraine