Which Premier League clubs will qualify for next season’s UEFA Champions League? We look at the latest projections via the Opta supercomputer.
The battle to qualify for next season’s UEFA Champions League is heating up, particularly given the Premier League now looks in a strong position to again secure a fifth spot in the competition in 2026-27.
Arsenal have bigger ambitions this season, of course, but they’re certain to qualify for the Champions League according to the Opta supercomputer. Although it’s still mathematically possible that they miss out, the Gunners finished inside the top four in every single one of our latest 10,000 simulations.
Mikel Arteta’s side have a 13-point cushion between themselves and fifth-place Chelsea in the table with 13 matches left to play.
Manchester City are six points off Arsenal in the league but are strongly favoured to join them in the top four at the end of the campaign. They currently do so in 97.7% of simulations, which is just ahead of Aston Villa (88.2%).
Villa suffered a blow in the title race this weekend, unable to hold onto a half-time lead to draw 1-1 with Bournemouth. That means they are now nine points off leaders Arsenal, and they’ve seen their chances of winning the Premier League fall to just 1.6% with the Opta supercomputer.
Chelsea and Manchester United still miraculously win the Premier League in at least one of the current supercomputer simulations, but even the most optimistic fan would surely see Champions League qualification as the best-case scenario now.
Both clubs have made fantastic starts under their new managers. Chelsea’s Liam Rosenior has become just the fourth permanent manager of the club to win their first four Premier League games in charge after José Mourinho, Carlo Ancelotti and Maurizio Sarri, while Michael Carrick has also won four from four since becoming interim boss at United.
Chelsea (47.9%) and Man Utd (35.1%) both now have a greater chance of finishing inside the top four than Liverpool (21.6%), who lost late on against Man City on Sunday, leaving them four points adrift of the top four.
Bar Arsenal and Man City, who look practically nailed on to reach the Champions League via finishing in the top four, the performances of English clubs in Europe this season is giving the chasing pack more added belief that the UCL is within reach.
Just as it was last season, the Premier League is the overwhelming favourite to earn an additional Champions League qualification spot for 2026-27, based on the Opta supercomputer’s projections.
Nine Premier League clubs qualified for European competition this season; nine Premier League clubs remain in European competition. In the supercomputer’s latest 10,000 simulations, the Premier League earned enough UEFA Coefficient points for an extra Champions League place every single time.
This is particularly important for Man Utd, who haven’t played in the Champions League for two seasons. If a top-five finish is indeed enough to quality for the competition next year, their chances of doing rise from 35.1% to 59.3%.
The real fairy-tale story could be Brentford, though. Following a summer of change off the pitch, where they lost manager Thomas Frank to Tottenham and key players Bryan Mbeumo, Yoane Wissa and captain Christian Nørgaard to other Premier League clubs, new boss Keith Andrews has surprised many with a record-breaking campaign.
Saturday night’s 3-2 win at Newcastle means that Brentford’s 39 points this season is their highest tally after 25 games of a Premier League campaign.
Brentford’s latest win means that Champions League qualification might be a genuine possibility for them this season, which is a remarkable statement considering they were playing in the fourth tier of English league football just 17 years ago.
The Opta supercomputer sees Brentford finish inside the top four in 7.3% of its current simulations, but the potential additional spot rewarded to the Premier League increases those chances to more than one-in-five (20.3%).
Of course, it’s still more likely that they don’t qualify for the UCL than they do, but the prospect of potentially hosting Barcelona, Real Madrid, PSG or Bayern Munich at the Gtech Community Stadium in 2026-27 could spur them on to one of the biggest shocks in Premier League history.
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