Rangers are racking up the cash in the Europa League after getting their first win over Malmo – but won’t benefit from UEFA’s latest proposal.
The move to rubber stamp solidarity payments will see the rest of the Scottish Premiership gain a cash boost amid Celtic’s Champions League adventure. The Hoops kicked off the 2024/25 campaign in the revamped league phase with a rampant 5-1 win over Slovan Bratislava – and will hope to pull of another big result in Tuesday’s clash with Borussia Dortmund while banking their share of the £40m cash bonanza.
And the run is good news for several top flight clubs with UEFA and the European Leagues Association approving new paydays for teams have have failed to qualify for the Champions League, Europa League or Conference League. After Celtic reached the group stage last season, £650,000 will be paid to the nine clubs who didn’t play European group stage football in 2023/24 – Dundee, Hearts, Hibs, Kilmarnock, Livingston, Motherwell, Ross County, St Johnstone and St Mirren.
The governing bodies of European football have now rubber stamped plans for teams that are not participating in the League Phase of a UEFA competition. Dundee, Hibs, Kilmarnock, Motherwell, Ross County, St Johnstone and St Mirren will make around £1.6m before the end of the campaign amid Celtic‘s involvement in the league phase.
Aberdeen will land around £1m over the same period having missed out on a payment having been involved in the Conference League last season. Newly promoted Dundee United will take home a similar figure having missed out on last season’s payday.
Hearts, who kick off their Conference League campaign against Dinamo Minsk on Thursday next week, and relegated Livingston will bank £650,000 each. Rangers will be left to rack up their own payments in the Europa League.
Philippe Clement’s side kicked-off their European campaign with a 2-0 win in Sweden on Thursday. And that banked the club a win bonus of £375k. A draw in the Europa League earns clubs £125k.
Rangers have already banked £3.6m for qualifying for the league phase of the Europa League this term after dropping out of the Champions League in defeat to Dynamo Kyiv. UEFA claim that a whopping £260m will be dished out to clubs across Europe as part of the new proposal.
A statement from the European Leagues read: “The European Leagues Association welcomes today’s decisions by UEFA Executive Committee to approve the new allocation criteria regarding the solidarity payments for non-participating clubs in the 2024-27 UEFA Club Competitions (UCC) cycle, which just kicked off.
“Considering the substantial increase of both matches and revenues generated by the new UCC format, the European Leagues has been able to negotiate and agree with UEFA on a higher share of financial resources to be distributed to those clubs which are not participating in the European competitions.
“This good result was also granted by the decision of the top five leagues to further cap their due share from the previous cycle thus generating an extra wave of solidarity which will benefit all non-participating clubs in other countries.”