No one dreams of growing up to win the Europa League. It's a competition that baffles new fans to the game (wait, who qualifies?) and annoys more established clubs that find their way into its mix. In recent years it's been won by some teams that you might not think of when making a list of Europe's top clubs -- Zenit Saint Petersburg, Shakhtar Donetsk, CSKA Moscow. When the world's biggest clubs entered, they've often come up short.
Hell, Fulham made the final.
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However, the competition has legitimate benefits to the clubs that participate and, most importantly, is treated as the Champions League equal by UEFA in compiling coefficients.
The Italian section of World Cup blog does a wonderful job today of breaking down all the reasons why Italian fans should be up in arms by the performance of Serie A's three teams in this year's competition. Palermo, Sampdoria, and Juventus all went bye-bye before the group stage was even finished. As pointed out those results have a tangible and costly affect on Italian football.
Namely, they lost a Champions League spot. Even though Italy has done very well in the Champions League it will still drop down to three CL spots and three Europa spots based largely on its pathetic Europa results (and Germany's better than average Europa results). Germany will get a fourth spot for the 2012-13 competition (coefficients determine slots one calendar year ahead).
Regardless of what you think of Europa League, you have to understand how devastating it is to lose a Champions League spot.
So, the next time you dismiss the Europa League think twice. UEFA doesn't, so why should you.
It's also a worthwhile competition on its own merits. Far more wide open than the Champions League it can produce some compelling football. When the third place finishers in the Champions League groups join the field for the knock-outs there will be some interesting battles. There are some big clubs in this competition.
Teams that have clinched a spot in the knock-out stage:
Manchester City
Poznań (Poland)
Bayer 04 Leverkusen
Sporting Lisbon
Dynamo Kyiv
BATE Borisov (Belarus)
CSKA Moscow
Sparta Praha (Czech Republic)
Zenit St Petersburg
VfB Stuttgart
Young Boys
PSV
Metalist Kharkiv (Ukraine)
PSG
Liverpool
Porto
Beşiktaş
Clubs like the defending champion Atlético Madrid, Villarreal, Sevilla and Borussia Dortmund remain in the mix along with likely third place joiners like FC Twente, Benfica, Rangers and Ajax.
Try and pick a winner out of that list.