Ka-pi96 said:
They both got put straight in to the group stage still. In Liverpool's case is was the 4th placed team (IIRC Everton) that got put in to the first qualifying round. That's when UEFA originally brought in the rule preventing 5 teams in the Champions League so in Chelsea's the 4th placed team (IIRC Tottehanm) didn't qualify for the Champions League at all. The fourth placed team would usually go in to the playoff round which is actually the 4th round of qualifying rather than the 3rd. When they changed the Europa League to give the winners a Champions League place they changed the rules so that now 5 teams from the same country can qualify for the Champions League again. Winning either qualifies a team directly to the group stage regardless of league position and only affects the league position qualifiers if teams from the same league outside the top 4 win both European competitions (and even then only in the top 3 leagues which provide 4 Champions League qualifying places in the first place). And yeah, the premier league does like to mess with UEFA's system, it's even the reason for the some of these rules |
I recall Liverpool won the competition but were made to qualify from the very beginning of the qualifiers that year Everton beat them to 4th, we had 5 PL teams that year in the comp, 2 seasons later a rule was added to prevent 5 teams. Watch them change the rules again when 5 PL teams are competiting and UEFA are secretly livid over it, ironic considering at the start of the season the was the risk of losing the 4th spot.
