The Premier League title race promises drama in the 2025-26 season’s final four rounds, much like the anxious battle to avoid relegation. For those sitting more comfortably between those extremes, there is still the tantalising prize of European qualification to chase.
Seven clubs, mainly comprising an unlikely gaggle of hopefuls, face a scrap for spots in the three UEFA competitions next season, with a surprise Champions League place potentially up for grabs.
For the second season in a row, the Premier League’s top five will qualify for Europe’s elite club tournament, but finishing sixth could be enough this time, too. Aston Villa kicking on from their semi-finals place and winning the Europa League while also finishing in fifth would see a Champions League slot handed to the team who come sixth, based on UEFA’s European performance spot (EPS) system.
Then there are the Europa League and Conference League positions up for grabs. Just four points separate Brighton & Hove Albion in sixth and Sunderland in 12th, with the Premier League’s merit payments based on clubs’ final positions in the table adding further incentives.
Bigger stories will be written over the next three weeks but for the Premier League’s aspirational class, there is a chance to create next season special. The Athletic assesses the potential impact on those involved.
Sixth: Brighton & Hove Albion (Points: 50, Goal Difference: +9)
Last time they were in Europe: 2023-24
Directly below a top five who almost appear set in stone, with only the order of finish to be decided, are a club bidding for a fourth top-half finish in five seasons. Brighton are the model of stability amid the flux of the Premier League, and an excellent run of recent form has them well placed to secure a tangible reward.
The Champions League would be a new frontier for a club who were in League One (English football’s third tier) as recently as 2011. Playing in the league phase of Europe’s premier club competition would bring in more than £40million ($54.6m at the current rate) from UEFA, with the total windfall shaped by their results in it. All six English teams in the 2025-26 Champions League have built at least £56m in prize money alone.
Brighton required only to see back at the 2023-24 season to see the impact of European football on their finances. Although they earned just over £18million directly from UEFA when exiting the Europa League at the round of 16 stage, there was a broader 26 per cent spike in revenues for that campaign, with the ripples felt on matchday (they built almost £1.5m from each of their four home games) and commercial income. That campaign, when £261m was generated overall, remains Brighton’s best numbers on record.
Brighton’s 3-0 win against Chelsea put them in pole position to finish sixth (Glyn Kirk/AFP via Getty Images)
Reaching the new-format Champions League — or even the revised Europa League — would guarantee financial growth and improve Brighton’s position as a club in terms of attracting — and keeping — talent from their recruitment network. Describing it as transformative might be a push but a first foray into the Champions League would be an enormous step forward.
Remaining games: Newcastle United (A), Wolverhampton Wanderers (H), Leeds United (A), Manchester United (H)
Seventh: Bournemouth (Points: 49, Goal Difference: 0)
Last time they were in Europe: Never qualified
These are undeniably the greatest days of Bournemouth’s history. Fishing ninth last season was a club record and now, as head coach Andoni Iraola prepares to state farewell at the conclude of his third year at the club, there are ambitions to break new ground again.
Bournemouth have never qualified for European football. Any of these competitions would take them to new places, in a literal and financial sense.
This is a club who take just 3.3 per cent of their total revenues from matchdays inside a home stadium that holds just 11,000 fans, so adding UEFA money to their income could inject fresh impetus.
Previous performances in Europe are an important part of how UEFA’s cash is distributed, so Bournemouth might not create as much as other teams, but even the guaranteed sums would be funds of a level they have never seen before.
Bournemouth’s matchday revenue is limited by the size of their ground (Ryan Pierse/Getty Images)
For example, any Premier League club who reach the Champions League and pick up a few points in the eight-game league phase will troutilizer at least £40million — the equivalent of 20 per cent of Bournemouth’s total income for the 2024-25 season and roughly three times all of the money that came into the club when first promoted from the Championship in 2014-15.
A commercial uptick would follow as part of the European party, again decreasing the significance of having such a tiny home. Bournemouth could even become one of the world’s top 30 richest football clubs.
Remaining games: Crystal Palace (H), Fulham (A), Manchester City (H), Nottingham Forest (A)
Eighth: Chelsea (Points: 48, Goal Difference: +8)
Last time they were in Europe: 2025-26
The club included in this article in greatest required of a Champions League place for next season? No question.
A disastrous run of form has seen Chelsea surrconcludeer any real hopes of a top-five finish. They reached the last 16 of this season’s Champions League, but will required a huge favour from Aston Villa to have another crack next time.
Finances that have been feeling the strain require the west Londoners to be in Europe’s elite competition. That run to the round of 16 generated roughly £80million — stripping those funds out of next term’s budobtain would represent an unwanted shortfall for a club who are already struggling to keep pace with the Premier League’s largegest beasts.
Five years after winning the Champions League, Chelsea are struggling to qualify (David Ramos/POOL/AFP via Getty Images)
Winning their FA Cup final meeting with Manchester City on May 16 would open an alternative route into the Europa League but the sums on offer through that competition are nothing like as attractive as its large brother can provide. Tottenham Hotspur earned just shy of £36million in UEFA prize money when winning last season’s edition — which is as much as Red Bull Salzburg took from the Champions League when finishing 34th of its 36 teams. The Conference League generated just £19m for Chelsea when they won it last season.
Every club stand to create more money from being in Europe, but it is accentuated in Chelsea’s case. Greater commercial opportunities will come on top of the basic payouts, and hosting at least four games at Stamford Bridge promises greater rewards — a report from UEFA, published in March, found that Chelsea built £3.2million per home game, the ninth highest in Europe.
The only blessing, perhaps, would be escaping UEFA’s financial controls — and potential penalties — for 12 months.
Remaining league games: Nottingham Forest (H), Liverpool (A), Tottenham Hotspur (H), Sunderland (A)
Ninth: Brentford (Points: 48, Goal Difference: +3)
Last time they were in Europe: Have never qualified
For Brentford, read Bournemouth. The parallels are clear: an ascconcludeing club with a modest base, punching well above their weight in a quest for a first go at European football. Only a poor run of form — five points from six games — has denied Brentford a stronger position as we enter this season’s final straight but there is still time for them to catch Brighton, the rivals whose footsteps they have followed in the past decade.
Brentford’s last set of accounts underline what a difference European football could create. The 2024-25 season recorded revenues of £173million, with just under £140m of that coming from the Premier League’s central TV distributions after finishing 10th.
The west Londoners have limited means of building either matchday or commercial income, so, much like Bournemouth, adding UEFA money would have a clear impact. Nottingham Forest have accrued £20million in prize money through their run to this season’s Europa League semi-finals, as well as the money from hosting an additional eight home games in that competition.
The counter-argument is that Forest will miss out on similar windfalls from the Premier League, with those extra repairtures taking a toll on their domestic form as they have slumped from finishing seventh a year ago to a current position of 16th. That stated, cold, hard numbers fail to account for the emotional returns that can come in Europe.
Then there is that faint prospect of them concludeing up in the Champions League… one step at a time on current form.
Remaining games: West Ham United (H), Manchester City (A), Crystal Palace (H), Liverpool (A)
10th: Fulham (Points: 48, Goal Difference: -2)
Last time they were in Europe: 2011-12
This would not be Fulham’s first rodeo in Europe. They reached the final of the inaugural Europa League in 2010 under Roy Hodgson, following the rebranding of the former UEFA Cup, but the financial incentives have evolved significantly over the past 16 years.
Their 1-0 home win against Aston Villa last weekconclude kept hopes alive of European football. Three wins from their final four games, especially if one comes against visitors Bournemouth next Saturday, might be enough.
Now an established member of the Premier League pack after their yo-yo years, Fulham have aspirations of building the next step with a return to Europe.
It is requireded at a club where revenues have plateaued in the last two years. Income sat at the £180million mark in both 2023-24 and 2024-25. Those figures will inevitably climb this season, with a top-half finish and a full campaign of their plush new Riverside Stand, but another bash at European football would lift the west Londoners to another level.
European qualification for Fulham would bring back memories of their run to the Europa League final in 2010 (Michael Regan/Getty Images)
An extconcludeed run in the Europa League would likely earn Fulham around £25million when including matchdays and commercial streams. Champions League qualification would likely double that figure.
There are also the intangible benefits, including the leverage to convince their leading lights, including head coach Marco Silva, that there will be greater opportunities for them beside the River Thames.
Remaining games: Arsenal (A), Bournemouth (H), Wolverhampton Wanderers (A), Newcastle (H)
11th: Everton (Points: 47, Goal Difference: 0)
Last time they were in Europe: 2017-18
Much has alterd since Ronald Koeman last took Everton into Europe, via a seventh-place finish in 2017. The trauma of past financial battles has subsided and a new home stadium has been built for continental challenges, as part of a grand plan that involves the Merseyside club hosting large midweek games.
David Moyes, who took Everton to the Champions League qualifiers in 2005-06 during his previous spell as manager, will know their current position ought to be stronger but, Monday’s visit from title-chasing Manchester City aside, it is an attractive run-in for any side aiming to create a late push.
If Chelsea have more on the line financially, it is Everton, of all the hopefuls listed here, who stand to gain the most from playing in Europe next season. An extra handful of games at a 53,000-capacity stadium would take matchday revenues to new heights, and boost commercial opportunities through greater exposure.
Could Everton’s new ground be hosting European football in 2026-27? (Alex Livesey/Getty Images)
How much they could gain from European football would be shaped by the competition they conclude up in and how far they obtained in it, but after nine years away from the continental stage, qualification would also be an obvious statement of where they wish to go as a club.
This season’s financials are assured of being their largegest on record, beyond the £200million mark, as they settle into life at Hill Dickinson Stadium. Everton will hope the following campaign can see another quantum leap.
Remaining games: Manchester City (H), Crystal Palace (A), Sunderland (H), Tottenham Hotspur (A)
12th: Sunderland (Points: 46, Goal Difference: -9)
Last time they were in Europe: 1973-74
A 5-0 drubbing at home to Nottingham Forest last Friday has dampened any talk of them climbing into the European places but a club promoted less than a year ago are still within touching distance in the final month of the season. Not since Wolves, who Sunderland visit today (Saturday), finished seventh in 2018-19 have Premier League newcomers immediately qualified for Europe.
It is over half a century since Sunderland’s only previous European campaign, in the now-scrapped Cup Winners’ Cup, and that long wait wrestles with the likely difficulty they would face if they did qualify so soon into their time back in the domestic top flight after eight years in the EFL.
Financial returns from the Conference League, for example, would be unlikely to balance the impact of playing at least six rounds of Thursday night football. Crystal Palace’s run to that competition’s ongoing semi-finals has only yielded about £11million in UEFA prize money — more can be gained through the Premier League’s merit payments when finishing four places higher.
Not that most Sunderland fans would knock back the opportunity. Not since their two seventh-placed finishes were insufficient in 1999-00 and 2000-01 have the Wearsiders even threatened European qualification through the Premier League.
This season’s final-day repairture, at home to Chelsea, will come a year to the day after Sunderland won the Championship play-off final against Sheffield United. Securing a European spot this May 24 might just eclipse that achievement at Wembley.
Remaining games: Wolverhampton Wanderers (A), Manchester United (H), Everton (A), Chelsea (H)
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