By: Adamo Marinelli
July 31st, 2020
With the Premier League season coming to a close this past week, we will look at who will qualify for the Champions League, the Europa League, and the FA Cup, and how each team will fare in their respective tournaments.
For the first time in over 30 years, Liverpool won the Premier League. They finished with a record of 32-3-3, claiming an astounding 99 points, one short of the famous 100 point milestone. They were the best defensive team, allowing only 33 goals against.
Manchester City finished 2nd in the Premier League, earning a 26-3-9 record, for 81 points, an impressive feat. However, they scored the most goals in the league with 102, 17 more than Liverpool, and they still had a great defense and counterattack.
Manchester United finished with 66 points, good enough for 3rd in the league with a record of 18-12-8. They had a goal difference of +30 goals, showing their depth on defense and in the midfield and their strength and creativity on offense.
Finally, Chelsea finished 4th in the Premier League, earning a 20-6-12 record good enough for 66 points. They had 4 more losses than Manchester United, which is why the finished 4th. Their offense is talented, but their defense gave up 54 goals, which will be a problem in the Champions League against the best European teams.
These four teams are guaranteed to qualify for the Champions League group stage next season and will play against the other best teams in leagues across Europe for a chance to win the Champions League.
Liverpool, Manchester City, Manchester United, and Chelsea also qualified for the FA Cup alongside 5th place Leicester City, 6th place Tottenham, 7th place Wolverhampton, 8th place Arsenal, 9th place Sheffield United and several other Premier League teams.
The FA Cup Final is tomorrow, and it will see Chelsea take on Arsenal. Chelsea beat Leicester City 1-0 in the quarters and they beat Manchester United 3-1 in the semifinals, holding off Man U’s explosive offense with their stellar defense, passing accuracy and ball control abilities.
Arsenal, after having a lackluster season winning only 11 games to that point, beat Sheffield United 2-1 in the quarter-finals, and Man City 2-0 in the semi-finals, shutting down Man City with their aggressive defense. Their strong offense is led by Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang. Three days before their win against Man City, they also beat Liverpool 2-1, however, Liverpool was taken out of the FA Cup with a 2-0 loss to Chelsea on March 3rd, 2020.
Chelsea is considered the favorite to win this game as they are the better team offensively and arguably have a better roster, however, they have surrendered more goals than Arsenal. Arsenal has been to 21 FA Cup Finals, the most in Premier League history and Chelsea has won 7 of 9 FA Cup Finals, their only losses coming to Arsenal. This game will be interesting. Chelsea has a spot in the Champions League group stage next year, so if Arsenal wins, they will also qualify for the Champions League group stage, sending 5 English teams to the Champions League group stage.
Finally, the winner of the Europa League, which will be decided on August 21st will also be guaranteed a spot in the Champions League Group stage next season.
Arsenal lost to the Olympiacos 2-2 on aggregate, as the Olympiacos scored more away goals in both matches.
The Wolverhampton beat Espanyol 6-3 on aggregate and are tied 1-1 with the Olympiacos heading into the 2nd leg.
Manchester United beat Club Brugge 6-1 on aggregate and leads LASK 5-0 heading into their 2nd leg. They will likely win their 2nd series.
Manchester United, Inter Milan, AS Roma, Sevilla, and Wolverhampton are favorites to win the Europa League and get a spot in the Champions League.
The Champions League will be nothing short of fascinating next season, guaranteed.
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