Manchester United’s unlikely route into the Champions League – Man United News And Transfer News

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There is a ridiculous scenario where Manchester United finish 6th in the Premier League and still qualify for the Champions League next season, but it’s reliant upon the club’s former manager – David Moyes.

West Ham are currently through the quarter-finals of the Europa League, where they will face Bundesliga leaders Bayer Leverkusen. The first leg is set to take place in Germany on April 11 with the reverse fixture at the London Stadium a week later.

Moyes’ side are also 7th in the Premier League table, three points behind United. They play Newcastle in the early kick-off tomorrow afternoon and, if they win by a sufficient margin, will leapfrog Erik ten Hag’s men into 6th on goal-difference.

Separate to this, UEFA – European football’s governing body – have introduced a new rule this year which sees the best performing leagues receive one of two extra qualification spots for next season’s Champions League.

The progress of Manchester City and Arsenal into the quarter-finals of this year’s competition, and Liverpool joining West Ham in the same stage of the Europa League, as well as Aston Villa in the Europa Conference League, means it is extremely likely England will receive one of these extra spots.

This changes the ‘top 4 race’ – as is customary for the Premier League’s biggest clubs every season – into the ‘top 5 race’, with 5th place sufficient to qualify for the Champions League. And this is the only reason, realistically, why United retain hope of gaining back-to-back qualifications into the competition under Ten Hag.

Following an abysmal season ravaged by injury and underperformance, United are currently 6th in the table with a goal difference of zero.

They are six points behind 5th-placed Tottenham Hotspur and nine points off Aston Villa in 4th, with a much worse goal-difference than both of these sides, essentially adding an extra point to each gap.

With only ten games to go, the prospect of gaining ten more points than Villa before the end of the season feels very unlikely. Clawing back seven points on Spurs, who have a tougher run-in than United and have ‘bottlejob’ inscribed into their DNA as a club, is a more reasonable ambition.

Yet, in a rather bizarre sequence of events, United may not even need to jump a place in the table to get into the Champions League.

UEFA legislation dictates that United could remain in 6th place and still qualify; it would simply require West Ham to win the Europa League, while finishing in 5th themselves, and no other English team win a European trophy.

If Moyes’ side were to pull off this unlikely feat, it would mean six English teams qualifying for the Champions League next season. This is because the combination of 5th place and a successful Europa League campaign would give West Ham two separate avenues into the Champions League, meaning their qualification through league position would instead fall to the next eligible candidate – the team in 6th place e.g. Erik ten Hag and his bandy of merry men.

Though if West Ham were to achieve their end of the bargain and, say, Aston Villa win the Conference League, this would remove 6th place as a qualification spot as per UEFA guidelines.

So while it would come a decade later than he would have liked, Moyes can still achieve Champions League qualification for Manchester United as a manager. Go on David!

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