The Barclays WSL team did not cover themselves in glory in the UEFA Women’s Champions League qualifying rounds, with no team joining Chelsea in the group stage as United and Arsenal were eliminated.

The four teams that qualified directly were Barcelona (Holders), Olympique Lyonnais (France), FC Bayern (Germany), and Chelsea WFC (England).

The 12 teams through from the qualifying rounds are as follows:

Seven teams from the Champions path: Benfica (Portugal), Ajax (Netherlands), AS Roma(Italy), St Pölten (Austria), Slavia Praha (Czech Republic), SK Brann (Norway), Rosengård (Sweden).

Five teams from the League path, where the two English teams were eliminated. Häcken (Sweden), Real Madrid (Spain), Eintracht Frankfurt (Germany), Paris Saint-Germain (France), Paris Football Club (France).

Obviously, the Arsenal and United eliminations do not paint a great picture of the Barclays WSL as a league, and it is quite clear that the 4th-place ranking by UEFA is not a statistical anomaly.

After all, it is based on a five-year period and England are far behind France and Germany as well as many points behind Spain.

Mark Skinner, the United manager, had a long rant yesterday in his post-game press conference about having to play PSG and multiple other points that need to be debated, but let’s have a look at some statistics since UEFA changed the format and reverted to a group stage with 16 teams where 12 come from qualifying.

The qualifying rate per country via the league path (5 teams per season, 3 seasons played) is:

1. Germany and France 4/6 66%
3. Spain 3/6 50%
4. England 2/6 and Italy 1/3 33%
6. Sweden 1/6 17%
7. Czech Republic, Denmark, Kazakhstan, Iceland, Scotland, Belarus, Netherlands, Austria, Norway, Switzerland Russia, and Ukraine 0%

England’s qualifying rate via the league path is simply poor compared to France and Germany.

The qualifying rate per country via the champions path (7 teams per season, 3 seasons played) is:

1. Italy, Portugal, Sweden 3/3 100%
4. Switzerland, Czech Republic, Austria 2/3 66%
8. Iceland, Ukraine, Albania, Denmark, Norway, Netherlands 1/3 33%

Italy and Portugal will soon end up with three teams in the competition each, replacing Sweden and the Czech Republic who had been the other two teams outside the big-four nations with three teams in the tournament.

Italy will get three teams next season instead of the Czech Republic, and Portugal are 80% likely to get three teams for the season in 2025/26.

So what could be done in order to improve the tournament? UEFA have so far protected the champions from all the top leagues by giving seven spots at the group stage to the champions path and only five to the league path.

If UEFA wants to have big names in the group stage like in the men’s game, the easiest way is to add extra teams to the tournament.

The other alternative, that makes more sense for me, is to get a 6/6 split between the champions and league paths. Or if UEFA really wants the big teams in they can give seven spots to the league path and only five to the champions path.

By doing this, they would avoid a lot of big clashes with seven seeded teams instead of five.

There is data that corroborates the idea that the league paths teams need more spots. Let’s look at the previous two seasons’ group stage points split between direct qualifiers, champions path teams and league path teams:

Direct qualifiers: 2021/22 15 points in six games. 2022/23 14 points in six games on average.

League path teams: 2021/22 11.2 points in six games. 2022/23 11.8 points in six games on average

Champions path teams: 2021/22 3.28 points in six games. 2022/23 3 points in six games.

The gap between the league path and champions path teams is huge. Will UEFA implement some changes? I guess so, but not for at least a season or two.

The draw for this season’s group stage will take place on Friday 20 and here are the pots, Chelsea are in pot 1.

Pot 1 (direct entrants)

FC Barcelona (ESP, holders) coefficient 126.233
Olympique Lyonnais (FRA) 118.166
FC Bayern München (GER) 96.333
Chelsea FC Women (ENG) 81.366

Pot 2

Paris Saint-Germain (FRA) 97.166
SK Slavia Praha (CZE) 39.233
Real Madrid CF (ESP) 37.233
FC Rosengård (SWE) 33.399

Pot 3

SKN St. Pölten Frauen (AUT) 30.050
SL Benfica (POR) 22.800
BK Häcken FF (SWE) 22.399
AS Roma (ITA) 21.000

Pot 4

AFC Ajax (NED) 18.400
Paris FC (FRA) 18.166
Eintracht Frankfurt (GER) 17.333
SK Brann (NOR) 7.100

There could be some spicy ties coming our way as teams in pots 2,3 and 4 are good teams and will challenge the pot 1 favourites.