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After Tuesday night’s Group E matches, it was confirmed that Liverpool’s participation in the Champions League this season would be over (well, after their match against Fiorentina in early December). The Reds will instead join the seven other third-placed teams in the newly-rebranded Europa League, entering the competition at the last-32 knockout stage. They won’t be the only so-called ‘big club’ failing to make the business end of Europe’s premier competition, with Inter Milan and Bayern Munich also facing the prospect of playing Fulham instead of Chelsea next year.

Bet365 have been quick to install Liverpool as 6/1 favourites to win this season’s Europa League and, considering that the Reds have regularly featured at the business end of the Champions League in recent seasons, many people will be backing the Reds for European glory of a different kind. However, it’s worth noting that the UEFA Cup semi-finals of the past five seasons have been populated more by teams who have been in the tournament from the start, rather than those who have dropped down.

The 2008/9 season was an exception to this rule, with UEFA Cup winners Shakhtar, Werder Bremen and Dynamo Kiev having played in the Champions League (Hamburg were the other team in the final four). However, the previous four seasons has seen 75% of semi-finalists originally entering Europe’s secondary cup competition at the preliminary or the group stages. During 2007/8, Zenit, Bayern Munich and Fiorentina were the originals, while the same could be said of Spanish trio of Sevilla, Espanyol and Osasuna in 2006/7.

Middlesbrough, Sevilla and Steaua Bucharest all made the semi-finals of the 2005/6 competition having not originally played in the Champions League, while AZ Alkmaar, Sporting and Parma were the originals of 2004/5. The point with all of these examples is that the bookmakers tend to overrate ‘Champions League teams’ when it comes to pricing up the Europa League. There is a reason why Liverpool, Bayern et al finished third in their group – namely that they weren’t good enough!

In addition, Liverpool could easily find themselves preoccupied with finishing fourth in the Premier League, rather than win a competition where there is only a limited amount of glory. While there is a gap in quality between the Champions League and the Europa League, teams like Shakhtar, Werder, Benfica and Valencia are more likely to comprise the semi-finals of the competition than Liverpool, Inter and Bayern Munich. Three of the last four champions have been teams who have previously earned the right to be featuring in this tournament and are therefore more likely to treat it with respect at the later stages.