UEFA Europa League 2026/27: Season Guide — Key Dates, Fixtures & Betting Preview

Aston Villa are the Europa League champions after beating SC Freiburg 3-0 in Istanbul, ending a 44-year wait for a European trophy and handing Unai Emery a record fifth title in the competition. Villa move up to the Champions League, and 36 clubs now chase what they left behind. The 2026/27 season starts on 16 September, with the final at Stadion Frankfurt on 26 May 2027.

UEFA Europa League 2025/26 — Final, Trophy & Season Results

The UEFA Europa League final was played on 20 May 2026 at Beşiktaş Park in Istanbul. Villa won 3-0 to lift the trophy for the first time and became the 31st different club to win the UEFA Cup or Europa League.

Detail 2025/26
Final Aston Villa 3-0 SC Freiburg, 20 May 2026, Beşiktaş Park, Istanbul
Coach Unai Emery, a fifth Europa League title: three with Sevilla, one with Villarreal, one with Aston Villa
Matches and goals 189 matches, 512 goals, 2.71 per game
Top scorers Igor Jesus (Nottingham Forest) and Petar Stanić (Ludogorets Razgrad), 7 each
Best player Morgan Rogers (Aston Villa)
Best young player Johan Manzambi (SC Freiburg)
Attendance 4,954,145 across the season, 26,212 per match

The UEFA Europa League trophy went to a club that scored 31 goals, more than any other side in the competition. These were the results that carried Villa there.

Round Opponent Result
League phase - 2nd of 36
Round of 16 Lille 3-0 on aggregate
Quarter-finals Bologna 7-1 on aggregate
Semi-finals Nottingham Forest 4-1 on aggregate
Final SC Freiburg 3-0

The semi-final turned on the second leg. Forest won the opening match 1-0 at the City Ground, then lost 4-0 at Villa Park. Villa finished second in the league phase, which spared them the knockout play-off round and gave them a shorter route than most.

Emery is now the most successful manager in the history of the competition. He won it three seasons in a row with Sevilla between 2014 and 2016, added a fourth with Villarreal in 2021, and a fifth with Aston Villa. Giovanni Trapattoni is next on three, all in the UEFA Cup era. Villa had not reached a major European final since winning the European Cup in 1982.

Two English clubs made the semi-finals. Forest arrived there after eliminating Porto 2-1 on aggregate in the quarter-finals and led Villa after the first leg, a result overturned in the return at Villa Park.

Europa League Games, Fixtures & Key Dates 2026/27

The league phase draw was made at the Grimaldi Forum in Monaco on 28 August 2026. Thirty-six clubs each play eight matches against eight different opponents, four at home and four away, across 144 fixtures. This is the third season under the format.

Date Stage
16/17 September 2026 League phase MD1
15 October 2026 MD2
22 October 2026 MD3
5 November 2026 MD4
26 November 2026 MD5
10 December 2026 MD6
21 January 2027 MD7
28 January 2027 MD8, final matchday
18 & 25 February 2027 Knockout phase play-offs
11 & 18 March 2027 Round of 16
8 & 15 April 2027 Quarter-finals
29 April & 6 May 2027 Semi-finals
26 May 2027 Final, Stadion Frankfurt

The top eight after eight matchdays go straight to the round of 16. Clubs placed ninth to 24th enter the knockout phase play-offs, and under the competition format, the 12 clubs finishing 25th to 36th are eliminated from European competition rather than dropping into the Conference League.

Matchday 1 Fixtures — 16 & 17 September 2026

All 18 opening fixtures, in the order UEFA lists them, with kick-off times in CET. Milan host Benfica in the standout tie of the first night, while all three English clubs are in action across the two days.

Date Kick-off (CET) Home Away
16 Sep 18:45 Ararat-Armenia Sparta Praha
16 Sep 18:45 Omonia Celta Vigo
16 Sep 21:00 Milan Benfica
16 Sep 21:00 Bayer Leverkusen Celje
16 Sep 21:00 Hapoel Be'er Sheva Dinamo Zagreb
16 Sep 21:00 Olympiacos Jagiellonia
16 Sep 21:00 Anderlecht Lyon
16 Sep 21:00 Sturm Graz Rennes
16 Sep 21:00 Sunderland AZ Alkmaar
17 Sep 18:45 OFI Crete Hoffenheim
17 Sep 18:45 Levski Sofia Salzburg
17 Sep 21:00 Beşiktaş Marseille
17 Sep 21:00 Celtic Ferencváros
17 Sep 21:00 Crystal Palace Lech Poznań
17 Sep 21:00 Viktoria Plzeň Union Saint-Gilloise
17 Sep 21:00 Juventus N.E.C.
17 Sep 21:00 Lillestrøm Torreense
17 Sep 21:00 Real Sociedad Bournemouth

Thirty-six clubs reached this stage by three routes. 13 entered directly, 12 came through Europa League qualifying, and 11 transferred across from Champions League qualifying: seven after losing in the Champions League play-off round, and four more after losing in the Champions League third qualifying round.

Route into the league phase Clubs
Qualified directly 13
Through Europa League qualifying 12
Transferred from Champions League play-off round 7
Transferred from Champions League third qualifying round 4

The play-off round second legs on 27 August settled the last places. Benfica went through 6-2 on aggregate against AGF, Ferencváros beat Trabzonspor 5-0, Omonia edged Sint-Truidense 4-3, OFI Crete won 5-0 against CSKA Sofia, and Beşiktaş came through 3-1 against Kauno Žalgiris. Qualifying involved 52 clubs in total and ran from 9 July to 27 August, with every beaten play-off side moving into the Conference League league phase rather than exiting Europe.

Celtic, Dinamo Zagreb, Levski Sofia, Celje and Hapoel Be'er Sheva all arrived after losing Champions League play-offs on the Champions Path, with Lyon and N.E.C. dropping in from the League Path. Union Saint-Gilloise, Sparta Praha, Olympiacos and Sturm Graz came a round earlier, beaten in the Champions League third qualifying round.

12 associations sent two clubs or more. England and France have three apiece, while Italy, Spain, Germany, the Netherlands, Czechia, Greece, Poland, Belgium, Austria and Portugal each have two, and 10 countries have a single entrant.
The 36 clubs were seeded into four pots by club coefficient.

Pot Clubs
1 Bayer Leverkusen, Benfica, Juventus, Milan, Lyon, AZ Alkmaar, Olympiacos, Real Sociedad, Marseille
2 Ferencváros, Viktoria Plzeň, Union Saint-Gilloise, Dinamo Zagreb, Salzburg, Celtic, Sparta Praha, Rennes, Anderlecht
3 Sturm Graz, Lech Poznań, Crystal Palace, Bournemouth, Sunderland, Celje, Jagiellonia, Omonia, Celta Vigo
4 Hoffenheim, Beşiktaş, Torreense, Hapoel Be'er Sheva, N.E.C., OFI Crete, Lillestrøm, Ararat-Armenia, Levski Sofia

Three English clubs are involved. Crystal Palace enter as Conference League holders, with Bournemouth sixth and Sunderland seventh in the Premier League, the latter appearing for the first time. Torreense provide the outlier, a Portuguese side who reached the league phase by winning the Taça de Portugal, while Ararat-Armenia, Celje and Lillestrøm complete a field drawn from 22 associations.

The full league phase calendar was published on 29 August, the day after the draw. Every Europa League game falls on one of the eight matchdays above, and none, at this stage, are scheduled for a weekend. Clubs from the same association cannot be drawn together, and no club will face more than two sides from any single country.

African Players to Watch

Ismaïla Sarr leads the African contingent, and he arrives in the competition off the best season of his career. The Senegalese forward won the 2025/26 Conference League with Crystal Palace, finished as the competition's top scorer with nine goals, and was named Player of the Season by UEFA's Technical Observer Group.

Seven of those nine goals came in the knockout rounds, and he scored in five consecutive games. His strike after 21 seconds against Shakhtar Donetsk in the semi-final is the fastest goal in Conference League history. He also covered 139.1 km across the campaign, more ground than any other player in the competition, and played the full 1-0 final win over Rayo Vallecano. Sarr has an Africa Cup of Nations winner’s medal from 2021 and reached a Europa League semi-final with Marseille in 2023/24, so this stage is not new to him.

He is not the only African forward in the draw with a Conference League golden boot. Ayoub El Kaabi won the 2023/24 Conference League top-scorer award with 11 goals for Olympiacos and is still leading their line at 33.

Marseille carry the deepest African contingent in the competition, with nine players across seven nations in their registered squad. These are the names to follow, taken from the squad lists each club has registered with UEFA.

Player Nation Position Club
Nayef Aguerd Morocco Defender Marseille
Bamo Meïté Ivory Coast Defender Marseille
Amine Harit Morocco Midfielder Marseille
Himad Abdelli Algeria Midfielder Marseille
Geoffrey Kondogbia Central African Republic Midfielder Marseille
Tochukwu Nnadi Nigeria Midfielder Marseille
Nouhoum Kamissoko Mali Midfielder Marseille
Amine Gouiri Algeria Forward Marseille
Faris Moumbagna Cameroon Forward Marseille
Ayoub El Kaabi Morocco Forward Olympiacos
David Carmo Angola Defender Olympiacos
Bruno Onyemaechi Nigeria Defender Olympiacos
Wilfred Ndidi Nigeria Midfielder Beşiktaş
Emmanuel Agbadou Ivory Coast Defender Beşiktaş
Junior Olaitan Benin Midfielder Beşiktaş

Registered squads for Marseille, Olympiacos and Beşiktaş as listed on UEFA.com, 9 September 2026. Youth-eligible List B players are excluded.

UEFA Europa League Tips 2026/27 — Who Will Win?

The market is tight at the top, and no club is priced shorter than 8.0 to lift the trophy. Here is where the money sits across both markets.

Club To win the trophy To top the league phase
Juventus 8.2 7.5
AC Milan 8.7 9.0
Bayer Leverkusen 10.2 7.0
Bournemouth 11.2 Outside top five
Olympiacos 11.2 Outside top five
Celta Vigo Outside top five 11.0
Sunderland Outside top five 12.0

22Bet decimal odds, correct as of 9 September 2026. Each market displays a top five, so ‘outside top five’ means a price exists but is longer than those shown.

Juventus

The market makes Juventus favourites for a reason. They are the shortest price to win the trophy at 8.2 and the second shortest to top the league phase at 7.5, which is a rare combination in a field this open. They also carry three UEFA Cups, in 1977, 1990 and 1993, more than any other club in the draw, since the only side with a better record in this competition is Sevilla, and Sevilla are not here.

The draw helped too. By the average club coefficient of their eight opponents, Juventus have the second-softest schedule of any Pot 1 side. They open at home to N.E.C., with Real Sociedad, Rennes and Omonia also visiting Turin, and travel to AZ Alkmaar, Ferencváros, Celta Vigo and Hapoel Be'er Sheva. Arriving from sixth in Serie A, they should have the points on the board early.

Bayer Leverkusen

Leverkusen return after finishing sixth in the Bundesliga and enter with the highest club coefficient in the field. Granit Xhaka still anchors the midfield, and the squad carries more European experience than most of the draw. Their only title in this competition came in the 1988 UEFA Cup, though they reached the 2024 final before losing to Atalanta. The market splits them oddly: 7.0 to top the league phase, the shortest price in that market, but 10.2 to lift the trophy. That gap says the bookmakers trust Bayer Leverkusen across eight games more than they trust them in knockout football.

AC Milan

Milan arrive from fifth in Serie A and are the only leading contender priced shorter to win the trophy at 8.7 than to top the league phase at 9.0. Seven European Cups sit in the cabinet, but this is a competition they have never won, and that gap is the story of their entry. They also drew one of the tougher schedules in Pot 1, opening at home to Benfica and travelling to Olympiacos, Salzburg, Bournemouth and Levski Sofia. Domestic and European commitments run alongside each other, though a squad of this pedigree should handle a league phase against this field.

Lyon

Lyon finished top of the 2025/26 league phase, level on 21 points with Aston Villa and ahead on goal difference, with 18 goals scored and only five conceded across eight games. That run ended with a 3-1 aggregate defeat to Celta Vigo in the round of 16. They dropped into this season's competition after losing a Champions League play-off, and the side that topped the table last season now sits outside the top five in both markets.

Benfica belong in the same bracket after coming through 6-2 against AGF and landing in Pot 1. The prices also reward outsiders: Bournemouth and Olympiacos are both 11.2 for the trophy, while Celta Vigo at 11.0 and Sunderland at 12.0 are the value plays to top the league phase.

Dark horse: Crystal Palace, Conference League winners and Europa League debutants, whose Senegalese forward Ismaïla Sarr was named the 2025/26 Conference League Player of the Season and finished top scorer with nine goals.

Our pick is AC Milan at 8.7. The market makes Juventus favourites at 8.2, but Milan are the only contender the bookmakers rate higher for the trophy than for the league phase, a signal they are trusted in knockout football rather than across eight league-phase games. Juventus have three UEFA Cups to Milan's none, so the pedigree argument runs the other way; the case for Milan is squad quality and a market that reads them as knockout specialists. Leverkusen at 10.2 are the alternative, with the strongest coefficient in the field and a 2024 final on the CV.

Compare the outright markets on 22Bet.