Mourinho: Only top three deserve Champions League place
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Jose Mourinho claims teams who finish fourth in the Premier League do not deserve to play in the Champions League, reports the Sun.
The Chelsea boss has given his seal of approval to UEFA president Michel Platini's controversial move to include the FA Cup winners in Europe's top club competition.
In the future, the FA Cup winners could automatically qualify for the group stage while third in the league would have to play in the preliminary round.
In a clear swipe at rivals Arsenal and Liverpool — both of whom have reached a Champions League final having finished fourth — Mourinho insisted change may be a good thing.
He said: “If the FA Cup winner becomes the fourth to qualify or if the FA Cup winner is one of the first three, I would be happy with that.
“The big teams here should not be afraid to finish fourth because then maybe then they don't deserve to be in the Champions League.”
Mourinho, whose side face Rosenborg in their opening group match tomorrow, added: “I will be on Chelsea's side, whatever that decision is.
“But Platini wants the influence of the Champions League in countries where it is difficult to reach.” -
Actually you know why the Champions league structure is so right now? It is to give the UCL more reach, because you'd have more of the popular clubs in the Champs League.
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Its all about the money from television rights.
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If he gets 4th this season i laugh
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by rite
champions league is all abt champions
why 2nd - 4th placing inside aniway -
Like that nothing much to watch alr leh.Originally posted by pierre^^:by rite
champions league is all abt champions
why 2nd - 4th placing inside aniway -
den no more grp stages.. straight away quarter final liao.. or mayb the knockout rounds...
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And shud be in round robin league 4mat instead wad
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need to giv some hope to the other clubs aso wad
like wad everton did a couple of years back.
if every year, the same old 3 top teams, then it will be a bit boring -
i agree with jose....they should take away champ league qualifers from 4th place team and let those champions from norway, greece, turkey,czech republic, scotland go straight to the grp stages without having to play qualifiers....
clubs from ukraine, turkey, greece and russia are very competitive now...they deserve more chances -
What are they trying to do to Ashley Cole in that picture?
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Same same...Originally posted by lpx88:If he gets 4th this season i laugh -
CL is supposed to be for the domestic champions of each european nations.
2nd to 4th shouldnt even play. -
This is a hard one i would say cos most other domestic champions across Europe probably won't generate much interest... Just look at last night's match between FC Porto & Liverpool... One i think is the Portuguese champion but were we really interested to watch them or Liverpool a 3rd place team from the epl?
I think had Porto played some other champion from Eastern Europe... I guess not many would be interested to stay up and watch... Also Chelsea, Would fans across the world apart from Norway bother to watch Rosenborg, the Norwagian champion? I seriously doubt it. It was probably the 2nd place team in the elp that made people took an interest on the match.
And here lies the problem... Would Tv station be interested to pay money to broadcast the match when there is little interest around the world? My guess is not. I would rather watch the top 4 from Spain, England & Italy fighting it out rather than the Champions of some European countries whose football standard is worse than the epl and la liga's representive to the uefa cup.