Struggling Premier League at risk of LOSING fourth European qualifying spot

THE best league in the world? By the end of the season, according to UEFA, the chances are that the Premier League will not even be in the top two in Europe.

00:10, Fri, Mar 13, 2015 | UPDATED: 01:19, Wed, Nov 8, 2017

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The Premier League could lose its fourth qualifying spot if results in Europe don't improve

Then, if English clubs perform as badly next season in European competitions, the fourth Champions League qualifying place will be given instead to a team in Italy.

That is the bleak wake-up call facing football in this country with Premier League managers at odds to explain why the richest clubs in the world are in danger of sinking to their worst collective performance in Europe for 11 seasons.

West Ham manager Sam Allardyce believes it is the lack of a winter break. Swansea boss Garry Monk feels English clubs are tactically naive.

But it was Jose Mourinho himself - whose Chelsea side capitulated so weakly against PSG on Wednesday night - who seems most aware of what is at stake.

"I analyse that we need points," he warned recently. "We want to keep year after year the same number of teams in the Champions League and Europa League.

"We don't want to lose positions in the rankings to other countries. When you don't perform as a country and rely almost on the same club season after season to try and reach the latter stages of the competition, it's not good."

The Chelsea manager had been asked to comment on the poor showings of Arsenal and Manchester City in the Champions League - two first legs performances which mean that, bar a miracle in the return, England will have no representatives in the final eight of Europe's elite competition for the second time in three years.

Mourinho congratulates PSG after victory over Chelsea

Before that, England last failed so dismally in 1995-96 - an alarming acceleration of decline. The mysterious "UEFA coefficient" measures the relative strength of its member associations and rewards them with places in its competitions accordingly.

Their website has a full explanation, but simplistically match wins and match draws in both the Champions League and Europa League are averaged between qualifying clubs to give a score for the year. Credit is given the further you go in the competition and the most recent five years are the ones that count.

Three seasons ago England were toppled from top spot in the rankings by Spain - now if Germany's three Champions League representatives Bayern Munich, Bayer Leverkeusen and Borussia Dortmund go much further in the competition, the Bundesliga will also leapfrog the Premier League.

More worrying, though, is the emergence of Italy, who still have no fewer than six out of six of their original entrants still involved in European competition.

Next season, 2010/11 - England's best ever in terms of point-scoring - will no longer count. It will bring Serie A right onto the Premier League's coat-tails and by 2017-18 - the rankings give teams a season's grace - the race for the Top Four at the top of the Premier League could become a race for the Top Three.

Allardyce, back from a winter break with West Ham in Dubai afforded by virtue of their early FA Cup exit, blames the lack of a winter break.

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We don't help ourselves with our fixture list
Sam Allardyce

"We don't help ourselves with our fixture list," the West Ham boss said. "Playing as many games as we do through Christmas and New Year and not having the opportunity to shut the league down for a few weeks gives every club that plays in Europe a disadvantage.

"When they come back to playing in Europe they may have a considerable amount of injures in certain areas and mental fatigue kicks in on players.

The Premier League clubs have not even debated the idea since rejecting it in October 2012 and the threat to England's UEFA coefficient has not been discussed in meetings at all.

Meanwhile, Monk sees tactics as the problem. "The Premier League is the best league in the world but more so for entertainment rather than technical and tactical situations," he said.

At the same time, Liverpool's Jamie Carragher, a Champions League winner himself, feels money has been spent too casually by cash-rich English teams.

Speaking at the launch of the Liverpool All-Star Charity Match at Anfield on March 29, he said: "The Premier League has deteriorated in the last few years.

"With the new TV deal, the clubs get a lot of money. But maybe because they have so much money, when you're buying players in it doesn't mean enough. If it doesn't quite work out you still have the money to bring another in." Qualification for the Champions League is now estimated to be worth in excess of £40m. Just so long as English teams don't count on it any more.