Euro odds narrow - but Liverpool don't apply for Intertoto

Feb 27 2008

EVERTON have applied for next season’s Intertoto Cup as the possible routes into Europe decreased over the weekend.

But Liverpool have not followed their Mersey rivals despite the growing likelihood that only the Premier League’s top five will be guaranteed a European place next season.

Tottenham Hotspur’s victory over Chelsea in the Carling Cup final at the weekend has taken one of the three UEFA Cup places available to English clubs.

And another berth could go to an FA Cup finalist unless Chelsea and Manchester United contest a second successive Wembley final in May.

Although the FA Cup has been won by a ‘big four’ team for the last 12 years, competition rules dictate that if the winners have already qualified for Europe by another route, the UEFA Cup place goes to the runners-up.

And with Portsmouth the only quarter-finalists to harbour even an outside chance of qualifying for Europe via league placing, it would almost certainly require another Chelsea-United final to give the team that finishes sixth in the Premier League a UEFA Cup berth. Aston Villa, Manchester City and Blackburn Rovers have already announced their application for the Intertoto Cup, although Portsmouth have decided against entering.

The top four clubs in the Premier League qualify for the Champions League, the top two going straight through to the group stage while the other two enter at the final qualifying round.

The only scenario in which this doesn’t apply is if a team that finishes outside the top four wins the European Cup and takes the fourth and final berth. UEFA clarified the ruling after being forced to allow both Everton and Liverpool to enter the competition in 2005-06 after Everton finished fourth ahead of their neighbours, only for Rafael Benitez’s side to lift the European Cup in Istanbul.

The rules now state no country can have more than four teams in the Champions League.