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2025–26 UEFA Conference League
European club football competition From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
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The 2025–26 UEFA Conference League is the fifth season of the UEFA Conference League, Europe's tertiary club football tournament organised by UEFA.
This is the second UEFA Conference League played under a new format involving a 36-team league phase.[1] The new format also does not allow teams to transfer from the Europa League to the Conference League from the league phase onwards, and thus the Conference League titleholders (Chelsea) are unable to defend their title as the winner of the Conference League automatically qualifies for the Europa League league phase.[2] However, Chelsea had already qualified for the 2025–26 UEFA Champions League league phase via their domestic league position prior to winning the Conference League, so the automatic berth in the Europa League was not required and the access list was rebalanced.
The final will be played at the Red Bull Arena in Leipzig, Germany.[3] The winners of the tournament will automatically qualify for the 2026–27 UEFA Europa League league phase, unless they qualify for the 2026–27 UEFA Champions League or Europa League through their league performance. In which case, the access list will be rebalanced.
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Association team allocation
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A total of 164 teams from 54 of the 55 UEFA member associations are participating in the 2025–26 UEFA Conference League. The association ranking based on the UEFA association coefficients was used to determine the number of participating teams for each association:[4]
- Associations 1–12 each have one team.
- Associations 13–33 and 51–55 (except Russia)[Note RUS] each have two teams.
- Associations 34–50 each have three teams (except Liechtenstein, which has one).[Note LIE]
- 15 teams eliminated from the 2025–26 UEFA Champions League and 41 teams eliminated from the 2025–26 UEFA Europa League will be transferred to the Conference League.
Association ranking
For the 2025–26 UEFA Conference League, the associations were allocated places according to their 2024 UEFA association coefficients, which took into account their performance in European competitions from 2019–20 to 2023–24.[5]
Apart from the allocation based on the association coefficients, associations could have additional teams participating in the Conference League, as noted below:
- (UCL) – Additional teams transferred from the UEFA Champions League
- (UEL) – Additional/vacated teams transferred from/to the UEFA Europa League
Distribution
The following is the access list for this season.
The information here reflects the ongoing suspension of Russia in European football, and so the following changes to the default access list were made:
- The cup winners of associations 39 to 44 (Bosnia and Herzegovina, Liechtenstein, Iceland, Northern Ireland, Luxembourg and Lithuania) will enter the second qualifying round instead of the first qualifying round.
- As a result of corresponding changes to the Champions League access list, there will be one fewer loser from the Champions League first qualifying round transferred to the Conference League second qualifying round (Champions Path) so one transferred team will receive a bye to the third qualifying round (Champions Path).
As the Champions League title holders (Paris Saint-Germain) qualified for the Champions League via their domestic league's standard berth allocation, the following changes to the default access list were made:
- As a result of corresponding changes to the Champions League access list, there will be one fewer loser from the Champions League first qualifying round (two fewer in total) transferred to the Conference League second qualifying round (Champions Path), so one transferred team (two in total) will receive a bye to the third qualifying round (Champions Path).
As the Conference League title holders (Chelsea) qualified for the Champions League phase via their domestic league's standard berth allocation, the following changes to the default access list were made:
- The cup winners of association 34 (Finland) will enter the Europa League first qualifying round instead of the second qualifying round.
- The cup winners of associations 45 (Malta) and 46 (Georgia) will enter the second qualifying round instead of the first qualifying round.
Teams
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 Conference League play-offs winners
- CL: Transferred from the Champions League
- Q1: Losers from the first qualifying round
- EL: Transferred from the Europa League
- PO: Losers from the play-off round
- CH/MP Q3: Losers from the third qualifying round (Champions/Main Path)
- Q2: Losers from the second qualifying round
- Q1: Losers from the first qualifying round[6]
The second qualifying round, third qualifying round and play-off round were divided into Champions Path (CH) and Main Path (MP).
Two teams not playing in a national top division will take part in the competition: Vaduz (2nd tier) and Spaeri (2nd tier).
Notes
- ^ Champions League (UCL Q1): Two of the Champions League first qualifying round losers will be drawn to receive byes to the third qualifying round (Champions Path), as two fewer losers will be transferred to the second qualifying round (Champions Path), due to Champions League league phase berths vacated following the Champions League title holders qualifying via league position and the suspension of Russia from the 2025–26 European season.
- ^ England (ENG):2024–25 EFL Cup winners (Newcastle United) originally qualified for the Conference League, but their berth was vacted when they qualified for the Champions League thanks to their league position. Nottingham Forest, as the club with the highest league position that had not already qualified for a European competition, took the Conference League place. However, UEFA ruled[7] that Crystal Palace and Lyon were both part of a group owned by the same company prior to the 1st of March, and as such could not compete in the same competition under UEFA rules (this decision is under appeal).[8] Crystal Palace were thus demoted to the Conference League, and their place in the Europa League was awarded to Nottingham Forest under a swap of European rights.
- ^ Gibraltar (GIB): FCB Magpies, who qualified by winning the 2024–25 Rock Cup, merged into Calpe City Magpies on 1 June 2025,[9] but will play as Magpies during the 2025–26 season due to registration issues.
- ^ Latvia (LVA): Valmiera finished 4th in the 2024 Latvian Higher League, but were disqualified and expelled from the league outright. In addition, the club was also disqualified from all European competitions including the Conference League. As a result, their place in the competition was passed on to the 5th placed team, Daugavpils.
- ^ Liechtenstein (LIE): The seven teams affiliated with the Liechtenstein Football Association (LFV) all played in the Swiss football league system. The only competition organised by the LFV was the Liechtenstein Football Cup – the winners of which qualified for the UEFA Conference League for the 2025–26 season.
- ^ Montenegro (MNE): Petrovac would have qualified for the first qualifying round by finishing second, but failed to obtain a UEFA license. As a result, their berth was passed onto the third-placed side, Sutjeska.[10]
- ^ Republic of Ireland (IRL): Drogheda United qualified for the second qualifying round as the 2024 FAI Cup winners. They were expelled from the competition as their owners, Trivela Group, also own Danish club Silkeborg, and Silkeborg finished in a higher league position than Drogheda did. No Irish club was able to replace them as the deadline for a UEFA license had passed. Second place Shamrock Rovers moved from the first qualifying round to the second qualifying round to replace Drogheda United. With an odd number of teams in the first qualifying round as a result, the next-highest cup winner Dinamo City from Albania also moved up.[6][11]
- ^ Russia (RUS): On 28 February 2022, Russian football clubs and national teams were suspended from FIFA and UEFA competitions due to the Russian invasion of Ukraine.[12] The tables reflect Russia's ongoing suspension from UEFA competitions.[13]
- ^ Serbia (SRB): OFK Beograd qualified for the second qualifying round but failed to obtain a UEFA license. As a result, the berth was given to fifth-place Radnički.
- ^ Slovakia (SVK): DAC Dunajská Streda originally qualified for the second qualifying round but were later excluded by UEFA due to multi-club ownership rules, because Győr (Hungary) also qualified. Both teams finished fourth in their leagues but DAC Dunajská Streda were removed due to Slovakia's lower position in the UEFA standings. Initially, UEFA cancelled DAC Dunajska Streda's second qualifying round tie, meaning whoever won first qualifying round match 20 would have received a bye to the third qualifying round.[14] However, Košice, the next highest-placed team of the Slovak league, replaced DAC Dunajská Streda on 15 July, in time to participate in the second qualifying round.[6]
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Round and draw dates
The schedule of the competition is as follows.[15] Matches are scheduled for Thursdays, with an exclusive day of 18 December, apart from the final, which takes place on a Wednesday, though exceptionally can take place on Tuesdays or Wednesdays due to scheduling conflicts.[16]
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Qualifying rounds
First qualifying round
The draw for the first qualifying round was held on 17 June 2025.[17] The first legs were played on 8 and 10 July, and the second legs were played on 16 and 17 July 2025.
The winners of the ties advanced to the second qualifying round.
Notes:
Second qualifying round
The draw for the second qualifying round was held on 18 June 2025. The first legs were played on 22, 23 and 24 July, and the second legs were played on 29 and 31 July 2025.
The winners of the ties advanced to the third qualifying round.
Notes:
Third qualifying round
The draw for the third qualifying round was held on 21 July 2025. The first legs were played on 5 and 7 August, and the second legs will be played on 13 and 14 August 2025.
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Play-off round
The draw for the play-off round was held on 4 August 2025. The first legs will be played on 21 August, and the second legs will be played on 28 August 2025.
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See also
References
External links
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