West Ham top seeded in Europa League draw
West Ham have been top seeded in next season’s Europa League trophy.
The winners of the Conference League start in pot one which means the club are likely to avoid many of the biggest threats in the tournament during the group stages.
Villarreal, Bayer Leverkusen, Roma, Atalanta and Premier League rivals Liverpool will all join the Irons in pot one. The rest of the teams in the top pot are yet to be confirmed.
Sporting Lisbon and Stade Rennais may still end up in pot one or two, while Real Betis are between pot two and three and Brighton, Freiburg and Toulouse could all end up in pot two, three or four.
With Liverpool, and our bogey team Brighton – who qualified for Europe for the first time in their club’s history this season – and West Ham all in the competition, it makes for an exciting level of representation from English football in Europe next season.
It will be interesting to see how the club balance out the responsibilities this season and whether or not the Europa League will be made a priority. If the club do want to go deep in the competition and compete in the league, they will certainly need some summer reinforcements.
The draw will take place on 1 September with the final set to take place in Dublin’s Aviva Stadium, which has a capacity of more than 50,000.