Coming soon to ESC... UEFA Club Qualifying

Which players will be hitting the ESC continental football clauses in July and August?

We have talked about the potential for GBE to be earned, and lost, in the UEFA Champions League this week. The big GBE points are won in the league stage and beyond, but what of those clubs who compete in the early stages of the competition, is there any benefit in following that as a British club?

Well, yes, and this is one that can be beneficial to League One and League Two clubs, as well as clubs at the upper end of the English league structure. Scottish teams in the Premiership and Championship should also spare some time to assess this stage of the UEFA competitions.

There is obviously a lot of British and Irish interest in this stage of competition anyway from a home club perspective. Celtic and Rangers are both involved later on in Champions League qualification, and The New Saints, Shelbourne, and Linfield, all enter the Champions Path in early July.

From a recruitment perspective it is interesting because Shelbourne, albeit suffering in the wake of Damien Duff's shock resignation, are still part of the EU, so they do have more free reign to look at their potential opponents, and their league competitors, and assess their squads to see if any players look good value. Linfield & TNS don’t have that kind of liberty as part of the UK.

Indeed, the non-English clubs are not even given the freedom of the ESC legislation that is allowed in England.

One of the ESC clauses is 1.1.7 “played in at least one match in continental competition”. At this moment in time, this includes qualifiers, so we are about to embark upon a whole new set of players who qualify for an ESC via that clause.

This piece identifies the clubs to target, and some players that could be interesting to focus on.

---