These are the teams which have qualified for the Champions League play-off for the 13/14 season.
That's not quite right. Those are the clubs that have qualified for the
qualifying rounds, which includes clubs like Ekranas. I've seen Ekranas play live. Spurs would ruin them if they didn't do their ACLs first on the dodgy Lithuanian pitch.
But look at who is in the actual playoff round already: Wanderers, Milan, Schalke, Real Sociedad and Paços de Ferreira. The last two are pretty weak sauce, but I don't know that we're obviously better than Milan…
Furthermore, the round before features the likes of Lyon, whom we managed to beat only by the skin of our teeth. Also included: Zenit, Fenerbahçe, PSV Eindhoven, and Metalist Xarxiv. So that's four clubs not in the group stages of the CL who have better UEFA coefficients than we do (Zenit, Lyon, Milan, Schalke).
Granted, the coefficients don't correlate super well with squad strength, since they're averaged over five years, and we're much better than we were in 2008/09… But our current rating also includes our performance in the CL to boost our own numbers…
Next look at who is in the group stages of the Europa League:
Valencia are the tenth best club in Europe by coefficient. I imagine we're better today, but I wouldn't stake my life on it. Lazio also are already in the group round… we didn't exactly take them to town either, did we?
We are, at least, the highest seeded club in the EL playoff round, however, and I think that, outside of Valencia, Sporting, Inter, and Liverpool, we are the club with the highest coefficient who has no chance of CL this upcoming year.
Of course, those final three aren't even
in Europe this upcoming year…