Hearts' possible Champions League opponents become clear after Aston Villa's English Premier League finish
European opponents will visit Tynecastle in July
Hearts’ potential Champions League qualifying opponents have been whittled down to two after placings were reordered over the weekend. UEFA’s complicated access system means Aston Villa finishing fourth in the English Premier League, after winning the Europa League last week, promotes Bodo/Glimt and Olympiakos into the third qualifying round.
Consequently, Austrian side Sturm Graz move into the second qualifying round as one of two seeded teams in the league path. The other is Fenerbahce of Turkey. Hearts and Polish club Gornik Zabrze are the two unseeded teams in the league path, so either Sturm or Fenerbahce will be travelling to Tynecastle Park in July.
The draw is scheduled to take place on 16/17 June - expected to be 17 - with the first leg on 21/22 July and the return leg on 28/29 July. The order of the draw determines which club plays at home in the first leg. Regardless whether Hearts are paired with Sturm Graz or Fenerbahce, they are guaranteed an extremely tough tie.
Sturm finished second in the Austrian Bundesliga this season, two points behind champions LASK Linz. They have a squad peppered with international players from countries including Austria, Poland, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Georgia and Slovenia. The Georgian midfielder Otar Kiteishvili, Bosnian defender Arjan Malic, and Polish cap Filip Rozga are all internationalists with experience of top-level football.
Sturm reached the league phase of this season’s Europa League and narrowly missed out on a knockout play-off spot by finishing 26th. They beat Rangers 2-1 in Graz and lost 2-1 against Celtic in Glasgow during the campaign. They would arguably be the slightly easier of the two opponents Hearts could face, with Fenerbahce operating on a different level.
The Turks also played in the league phase of the Europa League this year and progressed to the knockout play-off round by finishing 19th. They lost the play-off to Nottingham Forest but would still make very difficult opponents for Hearts. Their squad contains numerous Turkish internationalists, their goalkeeper is the Brazilian Ederson and their midfield contrains the experienced French internationalists N’Golo Kante and Matteo Guendouzi.
There are a number of safety nets available to Hearts as they try to navigate a return to European league-stage football this year. Should they reach the Champions League’s third qualifying round and lose at that stage, they would parachute directly into the league phase of the Europa League. That would be worth around £8m to £10m.
Losing in the Champions League’s second qualifying round mean Hearts would drop into the third qualifying round of the Europa League. Again, they would be unseeded and the list of potential opposition is daunting. Czech side Viktoria Plzen, who Hearts faced in the Europa League play-off at the start of last season, are in there alongside Midtjylland from Denmark, PAOK Salonika of Greece - another recent Hearts European adversary - and Austrians Red Bull Salzburg. Benfica could be another opponent, assuming they progress from the Europa League’s second qualifying round.
As things stand, Hearts are not guaranteed European league-stage football next season. They enter the Champions League second qualifying round and go into the Europa League third qualifying round if they lose. Defeat in the Europa League third qualifying round carries a parachute into the Conference League play-off round. Lose there and Hearts would be out of European competition before the end of August, so there is plenty at stake over the coming weeks.