Crystal Palace have been denied entry to next season’s Europa League after a UEFA panel found that the club had breached its rules on multi-club ownership.
They are now set to compete in the third-tier Conference League though they intend to lodge an appeal with the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS). The panel’s decision came after Lyon’s appeal against their relegation to Ligue 2 was successful, preserving their own Europa League place.
Palace earned a spot in the Europa League for the first time after winning last season’s FA Cup.
That UEFA decision is could have ramifications for Nottingham Forest, who qualified for the Conference League with a seventh-place league finish in 2024-25.
UEFA’s rules state that the next-best-placed club in the top domestic league of the same association will replace any team who drop out of its continental competitions, providing the replacement club ‘fulfils the admission criteria’ of the tournament and possesses the relevant license, but any confirmation of such is unlikely before the outcome of any potential CAS hearing.
The case came about as a result of UEFA’s multi-club ownership rules, as Eagle Football Holdings — the company run by American businessman John Textor — currently has a stake in both Palace and Lyon. UEFA rules state that two clubs cannot compete in the same competition if they are owned to a certain threshold of influence by the same person or entity.
Lyon finished sixth in Ligue 1 last season, also qualifying for the Europa League, and UEFA’s rules state they have priority over Palace, who ended up 12th in the Premier League, due to their superior league position.
Palace have argued that Textor has no meaningful influence at the club, while he has since agreed to sell Eagle Football’s 43 per cent stake in the south London outfit to New York Jets owner Woody Johnson. Textor has also stepped back from his role as Lyon’s president, with Michele Kang having assumed the role and played a leading role in the French club’s appeal process.
As well as the prestige of playing in a higher competition, there is differing prize money on offer in each of Europe’s three continental club competitions. The Athletic breaks down the potential financial impact of UEFA’s decision on Palace and Forest.
What do teams earn in the Europa League?
The overall prize pot for teams competing in the Europa League is just shy of double that of the Conference League, sitting at a cool €565million (£487m; $660m).
If Palace’s Europa League place had been confirmed, they would have immediately banked €4.31m for their league phase qualification.
The prize for winning a league phase match is €450k.
It is also worth noting the Europa League has eight rounds of matches, two more than the Conference League. However, the significant disparity in prize money between the competitions arises from the distribution of funds based on league placing at the end of the initial phase.
As well as €450k per win, UEFA also awards €150k to clubs for a draw.
Undistributed amounts — i.e. the remaining €150k prize money for every drawn game — are returned to an overall pot which is then distributed proportionally based on league finishes, using a shares system. At the end of the league phase, the top-ranked team receives 36 shares, the second-placed team 35 shares, the team in third 34 shares and so on, right down to the club in 36th, which earns just one share.
Each share is initially worth €75k in the Europa League — compared to just €28k in the Conference League — but each drawn game adds €150k to the overall share pot.
Meanwhile, teams ranked first to eighth in the league phase bank an extra €600k. Placing ninth to 16th secures €300k.
UEFA has said that Textor’s involvement with Palace and Lyon contravenes its rules (Lucas Figueiredo/Getty Images)
The prize money for advancing in the knockout stages is notably more fruitful in the Europa League, with the champions receiving double that earned by the winners of the Conference League.
The full breakdown is as follows:
- qualification for the knockout round play-offs: €300k per club
- qualification for the round of 16: €1.75m per club
- qualification for the quarter-finals: €2.5m per club
- qualification for the semi-finals: €4.2m per club
- qualification for the final: €7m per club
- winners can expect to receive an additional €6m.
All this means that means should a team win all their matches en route to lifting the Europa League trophy, they would earn a minimum of €32.5m.
So, what would teams earn in the Conference League?
Each of the 36 clubs in the Conference League’s initial league phase immediately bank €3.17m — an equal share of €114m money distributed to the qualifiers and up to 40 per cent of the competition’s overall €285m prize pot.
A further 40 per cent is distributed through performance-related bonuses.
For every victory in their six league phase matches, clubs earn €400k.
For every draw, €133k is added to the overall prize pot, to be distributed to clubs at the end of the league phase based on their finishing position, just as in the Europa League.
Should a team win all six of their matches, they could earn €2.4m in winning bonuses and a minimum of an additional €1.008m after receiving 36 shares, though the initial share value is likely to increase with any matches which end in a draw.
Should they secure automatic qualification to the knockout stages via placing between first and eighth in the league phase, clubs gain an additional €400k. Should they finish between ninth and 16th, they will receive €200k.
The rest of the performance-related prize money is distributed as follows:
- qualification for the knockout round play-offs: €200k per club
- qualification for the round of 16: €800k per club
- qualification for the quarter-finals: €1.3m per club
- qualification for the semi-finals: €2.5m per club
- qualification for the final: €4m per club
- winners can expect to receive an additional €3m.
That means, should the winner of the Conference League win every match in their run to lifting the trophy, they will secure a minimum of €18.4m.
How does it all compare to the Champions League?
Of UEFA’s €3.317billion prize pot distributed to teams competing in its three competitions, Champions League clubs receive 74.38 per cent of that.
That includes €18.62m for just qualifying for the league phase, slightly more than what the Conference League champions could earn.
Meanwhile, Champions League clubs earn €2.1m per win in the league phase, and see the shares distributed based on league position initially valued at €275k, meaning the first-placed team will earn a minimum of €9.9m, before winning bonuses and distributions for matches ending in a draw are calculated.
- ranking 1-8 in league phase: €2m per club
- ranking 9-16 in league phase: €1m per club
- qualification for the knockout round play-offs: €1m per club
- qualification for the round of 16: €11m per club
- qualification for the quarter-finals: €12.5m per club
- qualification for the semi-finals: €15m per club
- qualification for the final: €18.5m per club
- winners can expect to receive an additional €6.5m.
(Top photo: Warren Little/Getty Images)