2021–22 UEFA Europa League
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The 2021–22 UEFA Europa League was the 51st season of Europe's secondary club
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tournament organised by
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, and the 13th season since it was renamed from the UEFA Cup to the
UEFA Europa League The UEFA Europa League (UEL), usually known simply as the Europa League, is an annual association football, football club competition organised since 1971 by the UEFA, Union of European Football Associations (UEFA) for eligible European footb ...
.
Eintracht Frankfurt Eintracht Frankfurt e.V. () is a German professional sports club based in Frankfurt, Hesse. It is best known for its football club, which was founded on 8 March 1899. The club currently plays in the Bundesliga, the top tier of the German footb ...
defeated Rangers 5–4 on penalties following a 1–1 draw after
extra time Overtime (OT) or extra time (ET) is an additional period of play to bring a game to a decision and avoid declaring the match a tie or draw where the scores are the same. In some sports, this extra period is played only if the game is required t ...
in the
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played at the
Estadio Ramón Sánchez Pizjuán es:Estadio is the spanish language word for Stadium A stadium (: stadiums or stadia) is a place or venue for (mostly) outdoor sports, concerts, or other events and consists of a field or stage completely or partially surrounded by a tiered s ...
in
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,
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, winning the competition for the second time in club history, and the first since
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. The final was originally scheduled to be played at the
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in
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, Hungary. However, due to the postponement and relocation of the 2020 final, the final hosts were shifted back a year, with Budapest instead hosting the 2023 final. As winners, Eintracht Frankfurt automatically qualified for the 2022–23 UEFA Champions League group stage, and also earned the right to play against the winners of the
2021–22 UEFA Champions League The 2021–22 UEFA Champions League was the 67th season of Europe's premier club football tournament organised by UEFA, and the 30th season since it was renamed from the European Champion Clubs' Cup to the UEFA Champions League. Real Madrid de ...
,
Real Madrid Real Madrid Club de Fútbol (), commonly referred to as Real Madrid, is a Spanish professional Football club (association football), football club based in Madrid. The club competes in La Liga, th ...
, in the
2022 UEFA Super Cup The 2022 UEFA Super Cup was the 47th edition of the UEFA Super Cup, an annual football match organised by UEFA and contested by the reigning champions of the top two European club competitions, the UEFA Champions League and the UEFA Europa League. ...
. This season was the first since 1999–2000 (the first season after the dissolution of the
UEFA Cup Winners' Cup The UEFA Cup Winners' Cup was a European association football, football club competition contested annually by the winners of domestic cup competitions. The competition's official name was originally the European Cup Winners' Cup; it was renam ...
) where three major European club competitions (
UEFA Champions League The UEFA Champions League (UCL) is an annual club association football competition organised by the UEFA, Union of European Football Associations (UEFA) that is contested by List of top-division football clubs in UEFA countries, top-divisio ...
, UEFA Europa League, and the newly created
UEFA Europa Conference League The UEFA Conference League (UECL), usually known simply as the Conference League, is an annual association football, football competition organised since 2021 by the UEFA, Union of European Football Associations (UEFA) for eligible European foot ...
) take place, and the first outright where the Europa League (then the UEFA Cup) is the secondary competition of the three. As a result, major changes to the format of the Europa League were made. The number of teams in the group stage was reduced from 48 to 32 teams, and the number of teams participating in qualifying was also reduced significantly. The first round of the knockout phase also now involved only the group stage runners-up and the Champions League third-placed teams, with the group winners directly advancing to the round of 16. As the title holders
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qualified for the 2021–22 UEFA Champions League, they were unable to defend their title as they advanced to the Champions League knockout stage, and were eliminated by
Liverpool Liverpool is a port City status in the United Kingdom, city and metropolitan borough in Merseyside, England. It is situated on the eastern side of the River Mersey, Mersey Estuary, near the Irish Sea, north-west of London. With a population ...
in the
semi-finals A single-elimination knockout, or sudden-death tournament is a type of elimination tournament where the loser of a match-up is immediately eliminated from the tournament. Each winner will play another in the next round, until the final match-up, ...
. On 24 June 2021, UEFA approved the proposal to abolish the
away goals rule The away goals rule is a method of tiebreaking in association football and other sports when teams play each other twice, once at each team's home ground. Under the away goals rule, if the total goals scored by each team are equal, the team that ...
in all UEFA club competitions, which had been used since 1965. Therefore, if in a
two-legged tie In sports (especially association football), a two-legged tie is a contest between two teams which comprises two matches or "legs", with each team as the home team in one leg. The winning team is usually determined by aggregate score, the sum ...
, two teams scored the same number of aggregate goals, the winner of tie was not decided by the number of away goals scored by each team, but always by 30 minutes of
extra time Overtime (OT) or extra time (ET) is an additional period of play to bring a game to a decision and avoid declaring the match a tie or draw where the scores are the same. In some sports, this extra period is played only if the game is required t ...
, and if the two teams scored the same number of goals in extra time, the winner was decided by a
penalty shoot-out The penalty shootout is a method of determining a winner in sports matches that would have otherwise been drawn or tied. The rules for penalty shootouts vary between sports and even different competitions; however, the usual form is similar to pe ...
.


Association team allocation

A total of 58 teams from 33 of the 55
UEFA The Union of European Football Associations (UEFA ; ; ) is one of six continental bodies of governance in association football. It governs football, futsal and beach soccer, beach football in Europe and the List of transcontinental countries#A ...
member associations participated in the 2021–22 UEFA Europa League. Among them, 16 associations had teams directly qualifying for the Europa League, while for the other 39 associations that did not have any teams directly qualifying, 17 of them had teams playing after being transferred from the Champions League (the only member association which could not have a participant was
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, which did not organise a domestic league, and could only enter their cup winner into the Europa Conference League given their association ranking). The association ranking based on the UEFA country coefficients was used to determine the number of participating teams for each association: *Associations 1–5 each had two teams qualify. *Associations 6–15 each had one team qualify. **As the UEFA Europa Conference League title holders' berth was not used this season, association 16 had one of their teams promoted from the Europa Conference League to the Europa League, so they also had one team qualify. *Moreover, 37 teams eliminated from the 2021–22 UEFA Champions League were transferred to the Europa League. *In future seasons, the title holders of the UEFA Europa Conference League would be given an additional entry in the Europa League. However, this berth was not used for this season as the first edition of the UEFA Europa Conference League had not been held.


Association ranking

For the 2021–22 UEFA Europa League, the associations were allocated places according to their 2020 UEFA country coefficients, which took into account their performance in European competitions from 2015–16 to 2019–20. Apart from the allocation based on the country coefficients, associations could have additional teams participating in the Europa League, as noted below: * – Additional teams transferred from the UEFA Champions League


Distribution

The following is the access list for this season. In the default access list, the title holders of the Europa Conference League qualified for the group stage. However, since this berth was not used for this season, the following changes to the access list were made: *The cup winners of association 7 (Russia) enter the group stage instead of the play-off round. *The cup winners of association 13 (Denmark) enter the play-off round instead of the third qualifying round. *The cup winners of association 16 (Cyprus) enter the third qualifying round instead of the Europa Conference League second qualifying round.


Teams

The labels in the parentheses show how each team qualified for the place of its starting round: *CW: Cup winners *4th, 5th, etc.: League position of the previous season *UCL: Transferred from the Champions League **GS: Third-placed teams from the group stage **CH/LP PO: Losers from the play-off round (Champions/League Path) **CH/LP Q3: Losers from the third qualifying round (Champions/League Path) **CH/LP Q2: Losers from the second qualifying round (Champions/League Path) The third qualifying round was divided into Champions Path (CH) and Main Path (MP).


Round and draw dates

The schedule of the competition was as follows. Matches were scheduled for Thursdays apart from the final, which took place on a Wednesday, though exceptionally could take place on Tuesdays or Wednesdays due to scheduling conflicts. Scheduled kick-off times starting from the group stage were 18:45 (instead of 18:55 previously) and 21:00 CEST/CET, though exceptionally could take place at 16:30 due to geographical reasons. All draws started at 13:00 or 13:30 CEST/CET and were held at the UEFA headquarters in
Nyon Nyon (; historically German language, German: or and Italian language, Italian: , ) is a Municipalities of Switzerland, municipality in Nyon District in the Cantons of Switzerland, canton of Vaud in Switzerland. It is located some 25 kilometer ...
, Switzerland. On 16 July 2021, UEFA announced that the group stage draw would be held in
Istanbul Istanbul is the List of largest cities and towns in Turkey, largest city in Turkey, constituting the country's economic, cultural, and historical heart. With Demographics of Istanbul, a population over , it is home to 18% of the Demographics ...
, Turkey.


Third qualifying round


Play-off round


Group stage

The draw for the group stage was held on 27 August 2021, 12:00 CEST (13:00 TRT), in
Istanbul Istanbul is the List of largest cities and towns in Turkey, largest city in Turkey, constituting the country's economic, cultural, and historical heart. With Demographics of Istanbul, a population over , it is home to 18% of the Demographics ...
, Turkey. The 32 teams were drawn into eight groups of four. For the draw, the teams were seeded into four pots, each of eight teams, based on their 2021 UEFA club coefficients. Teams from the same association could not be drawn into the same group. Prior to the draw, UEFA formed pairings of teams from the same association, including those playing in the Europa Conference League group stage (one pairing for associations with two or three teams, two pairings for associations with four or five teams), based on television audiences, where one team was drawn into Groups A–D and another team was drawn into Groups E–H, so that the two teams would have different kick-off times. The matches were played on 15–16 September, 30 September, 19–21 October, 4 November, 24–25 November, and 9 December 2021. The winners of each group advanced to the round of 16, while the runners-up advanced to the knockout round play-offs. The third-placed teams were transferred to the Europa Conference League knockout round play-offs, while the fourth-placed teams were eliminated from European competitions for the season. Brøndby and
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made their debut appearances in the Europa League group stage (although Brøndby had previously appeared in the
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group stage).


Group A


Group B


Group C


Group D


Group E


Group F


Group G


Group H


Knockout phase

In the
knockout phase A single-elimination knockout, or sudden-death tournament is a type of elimination tournament where the loser of a match-up is immediately eliminated from the tournament. Each winner will play another in the next round, until the final match-up, w ...
, teams played against each other over two legs on a home-and-away basis, except for the one-match final.


Bracket


Knockout round play-offs


Round of 16


Quarter-finals


Semi-finals


Final


Statistics

Statistics exclude qualifying round and play-off round.


Top goalscorers


Top assists


Team of the season

The UEFA technical study group selected the following players as the team of the tournament.


Player of the Season

* Filip Kostić (
Eintracht Frankfurt Eintracht Frankfurt e.V. () is a German professional sports club based in Frankfurt, Hesse. It is best known for its football club, which was founded on 8 March 1899. The club currently plays in the Bundesliga, the top tier of the German footb ...
)


Young Player of the Season

* Ansgar Knauff (
Eintracht Frankfurt Eintracht Frankfurt e.V. () is a German professional sports club based in Frankfurt, Hesse. It is best known for its football club, which was founded on 8 March 1899. The club currently plays in the Bundesliga, the top tier of the German footb ...
)


See also

*
2021–22 UEFA Champions League The 2021–22 UEFA Champions League was the 67th season of Europe's premier club football tournament organised by UEFA, and the 30th season since it was renamed from the European Champion Clubs' Cup to the UEFA Champions League. Real Madrid de ...
*
2021–22 UEFA Europa Conference League The 2021–22 UEFA Europa Conference League was the inaugural season of the UEFA Europa Conference League, Europe's tertiary club football tournament organised by UEFA. The final was played at the Arena Kombëtare in Tirana, Albania, with Rom ...
*
2022 UEFA Super Cup The 2022 UEFA Super Cup was the 47th edition of the UEFA Super Cup, an annual football match organised by UEFA and contested by the reigning champions of the top two European club competitions, the UEFA Champions League and the UEFA Europa League. ...
*
2021–22 UEFA Women's Champions League The 2021–22 UEFA Women's Champions League was the 21st edition of the European women's club football championship organised by UEFA, and the 13th edition since being rebranded as the UEFA Women's Champions League. It was the first edition to fe ...
*
2021–22 UEFA Youth League The 2021–22 UEFA Youth League was the eighth season of the UEFA Youth League, a European youth club football competition organised by UEFA. Real Madrid, having won the title in 2019–20, were the title holders, since the 2020–21 edition w ...


Notes


References


External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Uefa Europa League 2021-22 2 2 Sports events affected by the Russian invasion of Ukraine
2021 Like the year 2020, 2021 was also heavily defined by the COVID-19 pandemic, due to the emergence of multiple Variants of SARS-CoV-2, COVID-19 variants. The major global rollout of COVID-19 vaccines, which began at the end of 2020, continued ...