Europa League – Yes or No?

This is not what you might think.

I’m not one of these pessimists, believing that Liverpool will suddenly crash and burn and end the season in 9th place, languishing below bitter rivals Manchester United and Everton.

No – Liverpool look set to finish in the top four and could cement their position fairly soon, given Arsenal’s horrendous fixture list and Tottenham’s trips to Stamford Bridge and Anfield.

Playing in the Champions League will be a fabulous experience for the men in red, with a few having already tasted that at Anfield or with other clubs. However, the likes of Jordan Henderson, Simon Mignolet, Raheem Sterling and Jose Enrique have yet to play at the ultimate level of club football.

The team is already very talented, but the squad needs to be strengthened in the summer, which hopefully will be achieved successfully with Champions League football on offer.

Nevertheless, as a team, this will be Liverpool’s first Champions League action since 2009 and their seeding is unlikely to be high. Therefore one of the European superpowers could join the Reds in the group stage as well as another top team. Brendan Rodgers could be leading his team into a group containing Bayern Munich, Paris Saint-Germain and Napoli potentially (assuming that Liverpool would be third seeds and according to the seeding for this season’s groups).

Of course, it is still better to play in the competition than not, as Liverpool can gain collective experience so that if they fail to qualify for the knockout stages then if they qualify the year later they will be more prepared.

But if they did miss out on a last-16 place in next season’s Champions League, how many would prefer to finish 3rd or 4th in the group?

4th means finishing bottom and ensuring an end to European football for that season.

3rd means entering the Europa League at the last-32 stage. Yet this is more of a banana skin than some might think.

Playing in the Europa League will immediately switch games to a Thursday-Sunday basis, which can increase fatigue over the long season. Furthermore, the Europa League’s group stage quality allows teams on the edges of Europe to make it into the knockout stages, ensuring long and tedious journeys there and back in time for the next Premier League game, plus any cup matches.

Having 32 teams in the knockout stage means an extra two games instantly compared to the Champions League and nine games in all to win the competition, compared to seven in the Champions League and none if Liverpool exit Europe. Again this can take its toll, especially if the Reds are involved in a stressful title race, or worse a top four race. More injuries could occur and the squad would have to be big enough to cope.

However, at the end of the day the Europa League is a trophy, and a big one at that. Sure, it might not be the biggest prize in club football, but it can stand on its own two feet.

This is emphasised by the addition of a Champions League place to the winners of the Europa League as of the 2015-16 season. Moreover, the finances that it brings might again be dwarfed by its big brother but is still TV money and tickets for the club to sell. It also ensures the continuation of European nights at Anfield whilst they look to return to the Champions League.

Due to the law that only four teams from one country can play in the Champions League, there are many top teams that grace the knockout stages of the Europa League, either through finishing 3rd in their Champions League group or qualifying outright for the Europa League. This season’s competition boasts Italian giants Juventus and Napoli, plus Fiorentina and Lazio. The two best teams from Portugal in FC Porto and Benfica are present, as are Ajax, Sevilla, Valencia, Shakhtar Donetsk and Lyon. Even Tottenham, containing the likes of Christian Eriksen and Hugo Lloris, harbour ambitions of winning the trophy.

People say cup competitions have lost their glamour and status but you only have to look at the Carling Cup final between Manchester City and Sunderland to demonstrate how much it meant to those fans. Being in the Europa League is akin to the FA Cup and League Cup, except you combine that with special European nights which are hard to beat, even if they are not in the Champions League. Liverpool themselves have had a few special ones in the past to go with their mammoth European Cup collection, such as in 2001.

I would rather be in the Europa League than nothing as it means a chance of a major trophy coming to Anfield. Despite its hallowed past, you never know if those days will appear again.

However, I look forward to hopefully seeing Liverpool strut their stuff at the highest level for as long as possible. After all, it has been nearly a decade since Istanbul.