Champions in the UEFA Play-offs: Celtic's Journey

The Sports Desk at the Daily Record have been having a chuckle over Celtic’s possible Champions League play-off options.

Down the years the hoops have faced some torturous routes into the group stage, and usually failed with trips to Kazakhstan and Azerbaijan pushing far east into UEFA’s borders.

As most clued up fans know that WON’T be the case this year, as the domestic season’s were coming to a finish in May a number of Twitter/X accounts kept supporters informed of every possibility.

As a domestic champion Celtic are in the Champions Route which provides five places into the 36 team competition.

Celtic are seeded, one of the teams with the five highest coefficients meaning that they will avoid Bodo Glimt, FC Copenhagen, Red Star Belgrade and Ferencvaros.

It was a straight forward process to follow, Dinamo Zagreb could have taken Celtic’s seeded place but on the final day of the Croatian season Rijeka won the Croatian title.

Since they have a lower coefficient than Celtic the hoops will be seeded, if Dinamo had won the title they would have been seeded with the hoops unseeded.

Celtic will have one qualifier, most likely to a well established footballing destination with FC Basel and Sturm Graz two of the five likely opponents.

24 minutes 50 seconds

CAW: Before we finish, Celtic will have a qualifier in a few weeks time, are you hopeful that it will be far flung, would you like to be sent back to Kazakhstan?

I mean who are the teams that Celtic could get?

SWAN: Honestly some of the places when you think back. Unbelievable, I’ve had two visits to Astana, one that sticks in the memory is Brendan Rodgers’ first time when he got to the group stage, the second leg in Hapoel Be’er Sheva was just an unbelievable night of… just ridiculous, it must have been about 260 degrees in that stadium.

Celtic were getting piled on, you think of the incredible night in Amsterdam (2001) they hadn’t done much in Europe for a while…

Some of the far flung places, obviously the seeding, I would imagine the seeding that Celtic are going to get, I think that they’ve got it, am I right?

CAW: Yes they are seeded.

SWAN: I think that can help but I think that there have been circumstances in the past where they’ve gone in against opposition where they were tipped to get it done and they didn’t so I don’t think that anything can be taken for granted.

NOTE: Craig Swan is without doubt one of the good guys but being inside the Daily Record for the best part of 20 years is bound to make an impact as he adapts to the group-think of the Glasgow publisher.

Celtic’s path to the group stage is fairly straightforward, all will become clear on August 4 with one round to be negotiated with five potential opponents.

NOTE: Craig Swan is without doubt one of the good guys but being inside the Daily Record for the best part of 20 years is bound to make an impact as he adapts to the group-think of the Glasgow publisher.

Brilliant
— Gerry 🟩⬜️🟧 (@GDCeltic2022) May 25, 2025

Maccabi, Slovan and Qarabag have two qualifying rounds to get through to reach the Play Off stage but will be seeded in those rounds with the matches starting later this month.

The third round and Play Off draws will take place on August 4, at that stage Celtic will discover their opponents with two definite options and three others.

For non-footballing reasons Maccabi Tel-Aviv is best avoided, hopefully they will be put out in the Second or Third qualifying rounds. That would leave Qarabag as the only potential ‘trip to hell’ option on the route to the Champions League.

Celtic played in Azerbaijan in 2015, winning 1-0 at home in the first leg with a late goal from Dedryck Boyata then drawing 0-0 in the return leg to earn a Play Off against Malmo.