Anderlecht seeded in second Europa League preliminary round
MONDAY, 26 MAY 2025, 19:43 - lajoya
OTHER Anderlecht will be seeded in the second Europa League preliminary round. Not all the teams are known yet, but the status of series head cannot escape Anderlecht. We explain how that works.
The second preliminary round is played with sixteen clubs of which eight are seeded based on their coefficient. That is calculated on the performance of the last five years and since purple-white missed out on European a few times, the coefficient is no longer dazzling.
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Continue reading Seeded (descending by coefficient): Braga (directly seeded) Legia Warsaw (still has to survive the first preliminary round first, but is in principle the best-placed team in that preliminary round) RSC Anderlecht (directly seeded) Partizan Belgrade (2nd highest ranked team yet to survive the first preliminary round) Sheriff Tiraspol (3rd highest ranked team yet to survive the first preliminary round) Swiss team to be determined, potentially with higher ranking than Anderlecht (lower is also possible). Yet to be determined Danish team, potentially with higher ranking than Anderlecht (lower is also possible).
Winner from a yet to be determined qualifying game from the first preliminary round. Potentially, this is a team with higher ranking than Anderlecht, namely Donetsk. However, this is not yet certain because of ticket rebalancing due to Russia's exclusion. So Anderlecht can still drop three places in the worst case scenario, but then still joins the series heads.
Unseeded (descending by coefficient): Cluj (although they can still advance to the series heads) Celje (must survive the first preliminary round, but is among the better classified teams in that round) Utrecht (directly seeded) Ostrava (directly seeded) Number 4 from Turkey (yet to be determined but definitely not a series head) Trnava (has yet to survive the first preliminary round, but is among the better classified teams in that round) Hibernian (directly seeded) Team to be determined from duels in the first preliminary round
From the potential opponents for Anderlecht, we can already write down Utrecht, Ostrava and Hibernian. Probably Cluj will be added to this. If logic is respected, Celje and Trnava will also be added. From Turkey, this will definitely be Samsunspor or Besiktas (1 matchday to go and both teams are 2 points apart). The last name is hard to predict, but the best placed and not yet named club coming out of the first preliminary round is Larnaca.
