How is European soccer structured with leagues and cup competitions?
The structure of European football is complex. Although governing body UEFA oversees continental competitions, individual nations are able to operate their domestic leagues and cups in a manner best suited to the country. This has created a range of differing leagues, as well as qualification processes for the UEFA Champions League, Europa League and Conference League.
There are 55 national association members in UEFA. Some of those are not sovereign nations, such as Gibraltar and the Faroe Islands, while sovereign states like Monaco and the Vatican City are not represented. Some, such as Kazakhstan, are not geographically recognised as being in Europe. For some people, that's like having Australia compete in Eurovision…
Imagine if all 50 US states, plus territories like Guam and Puerto Rico, had their own governing bodies deciding how their soccer leagues – consisting of numerous levels – should operate. That is European football.
So how are domestic leagues structured?
With the exception of the small Alpine nation of Liechtenstein, all UEFA members run their own domestic league system. This is sometimes referred to as the 'pyramid', with a nationwide first division at the top. Below that, as the pyramid widens, is where things differ. Depending on population size and the number of clubs, divisions will either remain nationwide or eventually split to become regional. That creates the pyramid shape in a diagram.
Focusing on the top tier, the most common format consists of each team playing the other twice – once at home and once away – from fall to spring. Others in colder climates will perhaps run within a single calendar year or have an extended winter break to avoid playing in freezing conditions. In any case, it's three points for a win, one for a draw, and the team with the most points after all the games is the champion.
When it comes to teams tied for points, leagues define criteria to determine who is ahead. The first of those is often who has the higher goal difference (goals scored minus goals conceded) over the course of the season, followed by goals scored and so on. Some leagues, however, use the head-to-head record between rival teams as the first criteria after points, including away goals, before continuing with other season-spanning statistics. This has been known to go as far as the team with the fewest yellow cards. If needed, teams can also be separated by an additional one-off match, the drawing of lots, or a coin toss.
What may be considered the 'regular season' in the USA is in fact just 'the season' in most European leagues. For them, any reference to the 'play-offs' is usually to do with promotion and relegation (more on that later).
In the Bundesliga, 18 teams play a total of 34 matches each – two against each team, once at home and once away – in a random order set out by the fixture list. The English Premier League, Spain's La Liga, Italy's Serie A and France's Ligue 1 – the other leagues considered Europe's "big five" – all consist of 20 teams, resulting in 38 rounds of fixtures.
There is no one-size-fits-all approach, though. Scotland, for example, has three parts to its 'regular season'. Since the Scottish Premiership consists of only 12 teams, the first 22 rounds of fixtures see them play the customary home and away match against each other. They then play each other a third time, either home or away depending on how the fixtures are drawn.
Once 33 games have been played, the league 'splits' into two halves of six teams. Each club will then play five more matches against the other teams in their half. The champion is again the team that finishes with the most points, but teams cannot leave their half of the table. This can result in an odd situation where seventh place may have more points than sixth come the end of 38 games.
Watch: Promotion highs, relegation lows in 2016/17
Things are even more complex in Belgium. After 30 rounds of fixtures in the 16-team league, the top six then enter the championship play-offs. Their regular season points are halved as they begin a new mini league, playing home and away against each other to determine the champion and also European qualifiers.
Teams seventh to 12th compete in the Europe play-offs, with the winner there competing against fourth from the championship play-off to get into continental competition. The bottom four contest the relegation play-off. The bottom two go down, with third-bottom then playing another play-off against the winner of the promotion play-off from the second division.
The point is, each league can do things how they want.
What is promotion and relegation?
The great difference with soccer in the USA and Major League Soccer, however, is the system of promotion and relegation.
In Europe, teams move between levels of the pyramid at the end of each season. That means a set number of clubs at the bottom end of a division (except in the bottom-most league) will drop into the one below. Sides finishing at the top end of all leagues – bar the top tier – will move up a level.
It will be no surprise, though, that things aren't quite that simple and are rarely uniform across leagues and countries. For example, the Bundesliga has two automatic promotion and relegation places. The top two sides at the end of the Bundesliga 2 campaign therefore replace the bottom two in the Bundesliga.
There is one more spot available that isn't automatic. Since 2008, the team finishing third from bottom in the Bundesliga faces the side third in Bundesliga 2 over a two-legged play-off. The winner plays in the Bundesliga the following year. A similar practice is used in France's Ligue 1, although the team third from bottom there will face the winner of a series of play-offs between the sides finishing third to fifth in Ligue 2.
Across the remainder of Europe's "big five", they use another slightly different method. In the Premier League, La Liga and Serie A, the bottom three teams are automatically relegated, but there are just two automatic promotion positions from the league below – the Championship, Segunda División, and Serie B respectively.
In England, the third team in the second-tier Championship plays sixth while fourth faces fifth in two-legged semi-finals, before a one-off final at Wembley to determine the third promoted team. In Spain, both semi-finals and the final consist of two legs.
In Italy, teams third through eighth in Serie B enter the play-offs. Fifth plays eighth and sixth hosts seventh over one leg. The winners then face a two-legged clash with either third or fourth, with the victors of those semi-finals contesting a two-legged final.
Similar patterns are found throughout the continent, and play-offs are usually seen as end-of-season highlights before the summer break.
Are the cups linked to the leagues?
While the MLS Cup is what decides the league's champion at the end of the regular season and play-offs, European cup competitions are nothing to do with the domestic leagues.
The limit of a league's involvement in a cup is often at what stage certain teams enter the draw, or who they can be drawn against.
National cups are predominantly run by the national association, who nowadays tend to no longer run the top domestic leagues. In Germany, for example, the DFL (Deutsche Fußball Liga) controls the Bundesliga and Bundesliga 2, while the DFB (Deutscher Fußball-Bund, or German FA) organises the nationwide third division and the cup – the DFB Cup (DFB-Pokal). Below the third tier, regional associations organise leagues under the umbrella of the DFB.
The national cup holds great prestige for teams and has often been in existence longer than the league system. Cups are usually knockout tournaments over one or two legs, culminating in an end-of-season final. The winners are often also rewarded with European qualification if not already achieved through their league position (more on that later).
A team that wins both the top division and cup in their country is said to have won the domestic double. In Germany this has happened 17 times, with Bayern Munich completing a league and cup double on 13 occasions. Three trophies is a treble, four a quadruple and so on.
There are sometimes also secondary cups. A league cup, organised by the league association, was once common but has started to fall out of fashion. From 2020/21, England will be the only nation among the top five to still hold a league cup.
There are also cups available solely to teams outside of the top division(s), or regional cups, often for non-professional clubs. Eligibility for these competitions, though, is as linked as leagues get to most cups.
And a special mention again to Liechtenstein. Although its teams compete in the Swiss league system, it does have its own domestic cup competition, allowing clubs from one of the world's two doubly landlocked countries a chance to compete in the Europa League under their national flag.
That is different from AS Monaco, though. Monaco is an independent nation but – due to its size – it has no professional domestic league or cup. This means that the club plays in the French system and represents France in Europe.
How does European qualification work?
'Qualification for Europe' may sound an odd phrase when you already play in Europe. It refers to being able to compete in one of the continental club competitions organised by UEFA. This does not include the European Championship, known as the Euros, which is for national teams.
There are currently three Europe-wide club competitions: the Champions League, the Europa League and the Conference League.
This is not to be confused with a domestic pyramid structure. There is no promotion or relegation between these leagues. Participation is based on the team's performances the previous season.
Qualification for these competitions is primarily decided by domestic league positions, although domestic cup competitions also usually offer a route into Europe. All this, however, depends on a country's UEFA coefficient.
This is a ranking based on the performances of clubs from each league in European competition over a set period. The higher ranked a league is, the more European qualification berths they're allotted.
Some of these berths earn teams the right to go straight into the competition itself, beginning in the group stage. Others still have to go through qualifying – consisting of up to five rounds – to reach that stage. So qualification for Europe sometimes means qualifying for the chance to qualify for Europe.
For rules for the Champions League change in 2024 as a new format is introduced and the competition expanded.
The base ruling is that the holders and previous Europa League winners are joined by the champions of the top 10 ranked nations, the six runners-up from the top six, and the third-placed teams from the top five and also the fourth-placed teams from the top four. There will also be two addiitonal berths granted to the associations with the highest coefficients from the previous season, i.e. the Bundesliga could get five teams in the Champions League if its clubs performed well the previous year.
Should the holders of the two European competitions already qualify via their league position, that opens up the opportunity for an extra club from another league to gain automatic entry.
The remaining aeven places are made up of teams that have gone through the qualification process.
The 30 champions from associations ranked 25-55 (except league-less Liechtenstein) contest the first round. The 15 winners are joined by the nine champions from associations 15-24 (currently except Russia due to suspension) in the 'champions path' and then the six runners-up from associations 10-15 in the 'league path'.
The twelve winners from the champions path go into the third round, while the three league path winners are joined by the three runners-up from associations 7-9, the third-place team from association 6 and the fourth-placed team from association 5.
The six champions path winners then contest the play-off in addition to the four champions from associations 11-14, with the winners going into the group stage. As do the four winners from the league path.
How does European qualification work in Germany?
With the Bundesliga currently ranked among Europe's top four leagues, German clubs finishing in the top four can avoid an arduous qualification process by entering straight into the group stage.
Winning a domestic cup does not earn you a place in the Champions League, but it is one way of reaching the Europa League – formerly known as the UEFA Cup.
A similarly long qualification process is also needed there, consisting of a mix of cup winners from lower-ranked nations, teams finishing between second and sixth in their domestic league (depending on association ranking) and teams knocked out of Champions League qualification.
In Bundesliga terms, though, fifth place goes directly into the group stage alongside the DFB Cup winners, while sixth place goes into Conference League qualifying round. This is assuming that the Bundesliga does not get its additional fifth Champions League berth.
Should the DFB Cup winners finish fifth or better in the Bundesliga, the team in sixth will automatically enter the Europa League and seventh place into the Conference League.
It's a complicated process for those teams playing in lower-ranked leagues, but relatively straightforward for those in the Bundesliga due to the league's high standing on the continent.
What is a super cup?
So, there are leagues, cups, Champions Leagues, Europa Leagues, Conference Leagues – but what about a super cup, sometimes also written as 'Supercup'?
There are both domestic and continental super cups.
For the latter, it consists of a one-off match on neutral ground between the previous winners of the Champions League and Europa League, being played early the following season. Note that the winner of the Champions League represents Europe at the FIFA Club World Cup regardless of the outcome of the UEFA Super Cup.
Domestically, not every country will hold a form of super cup, but it is generally contested between the winners of the league and the cup. In Germany, that sees the winners of the DFB Cup traditionally host the Bundesliga champions in the Supercup the week before the main season begins. In the event that one team wins both, the Bundesliga runners-up are next in line to compete.
Watch: Highlights of the season-opening 2019 Supercup between Dortmund and Bayern
The same happens in England, with the Community Shield played at Wembley between the Premier League champions and FA Cup winners in August.
In Italy, the Supercoppa Italiana is now generally held abroad and features the cup runner-up in the event of a domestic double. It is played either the week before the new season or in December/January, depending on its location.
Spain previously held their Supercopa over two legs. After one year with a one-off match at a neutral venue, they have now introduced a new format featuring four teams contesting one-legged semi-finals and a final featuring the Copa del Rey finalists and the next two highest-ranked league teams.
All in all, as is so often the case in Europe, things differ in every country. The principle remains the same, with domestic silverware and European qualification on the line. Knowing how teams in a specific country achieve that, however, requires a little bit of research.
