2015–16 UEFA Europa League

Format changes

The UEFA Executive Committee held in May and September 2013 approved the following changes to the UEFA Europa League starting from the 2015–16 season (for the three-year cycle until the 2017–18 season):

Association team allocation

A total of 191 teams from all 54 UEFA member associations participated in the 2015–16 UEFA Europa League. The association ranking based on the UEFA country coefficients was used to determine the number of participating teams for each association:

Association ranking

For the 2015–16 UEFA Europa League, the associations were allocated places according to their 2014 UEFA country coefficients, which took into account their performance in European competitions from 2009–10 to 2013–14.

Apart from the allocation based on the country coefficients, associations may have additional teams participating in the Europa League, as noted below:

Distribution

In the default access list, Sevilla enter the group stage (as the fifth-placed team of the 2014–15 La Liga). However, since they qualified for the Champions League as the Europa League title holders, the spot which they qualified for in the Europa League group stage is vacated, and the following changes to the default allocation system are made:

Redistribution rules

A Europa League place is vacated when a team qualifies for both the Champions League and the Europa League, or qualifies for the Europa League by more than one method. When a place is vacated, it is redistributed within the national association by the following rules (regulations Articles 3.03 and 3.04):

Teams

The labels in the parentheses show how each team qualified for the place of its starting round:

Notably two teams took part in the competition that were not playing in their national top-division. They were Go Ahead Eagles (2nd tier) and UCD (2nd tier).

Round and draw dates

The schedule of the competition is as follows (all draws are held at UEFA headquarters in Nyon, Switzerland, unless stated otherwise).

Matches in the qualifying, play-off, and knockout rounds may also be played on Tuesdays or Wednesdays instead of the regular Thursdays due to scheduling conflicts.

Qualifying rounds

In the qualifying rounds and the play-off round, teams are divided into seeded and unseeded teams based on their 2015 UEFA club coefficients, and then drawn into two-legged home-and-away ties. Teams from the same association cannot be drawn against each other.

First qualifying round

The draw for the first and second qualifying round was held on 22 June 2015. With 102 teams involved, it was UEFA's biggest ever tournament draw. The first legs were played on 30 June and 2 July, and the second legs were played on 7 and 9 July 2015.

Second qualifying round

The first legs were played on 16 July, and the second legs were played on 21 and 23 July 2015.

Third qualifying round

The draw for the third qualifying round was held on 17 July 2015. The first legs were played on 29 and 30 July, and the second legs were played on 6 August 2015.

Play-off round

The draw for the play-off round was held on 7 August 2015. The first legs were played on 20 August, and the second legs were played on 27 August 2015.

Group stage

The draw for the group stage was held in Monaco on 28 August 2015. The 48 teams were drawn into twelve groups of four, with the restriction that teams from the same association could not be drawn against each other. For the draw, the teams were seeded into four pots based on their 2015 UEFA club coefficients.

In each group, teams played against each other home-and-away in a round-robin format. The group winners and runners-up advanced to the round of 32, where they were joined by the eight third-placed teams of the 2015–16 UEFA Champions League group stage. The matchdays were 17 September, 1 October, 22 October, 5 November, 26 November, and 10 December 2015.

A total of 24 national associations were represented in the group stage. Augsburg, Belenenses, Gabala, Groningen, Midtjylland, Monaco, Sion and Skënderbeu Korçë made their debut appearances in the group stage (although Monaco have appeared in the UEFA Cup group stage). Skënderbeu Korçë were the first team from Albania to play in the group stage of any UEFA club competition.

Knockout phase

In the knockout phase, teams played against each other over two legs on a home-and-away basis, except for the one-match final. The mechanism of the draws for each round was as follows:

Round of 32

The draw for the round of 32 was held on 14 December 2015. The first legs were played on 16 and 18 February, and the second legs were played on 24 and 25 February 2016.

Round of 16

The draw for the round of 16 was held on 26 February 2016. The first legs were played on 10 March, and the second legs were played on 17 March 2016.

Quarter-finals

The draw for the quarter-finals was held on 18 March 2016. The first legs were played on 7 April, and the second legs were played on 14 April 2016.

Semi-finals

The draw for the semi-finals was held on 15 April 2016. The first legs were played on 28 April, and the second legs were played on 5 May 2016.

Final

The final was played on 18 May 2016 at the St. Jakob-Park in Basel, Switzerland. The "home" team (for administrative purposes) was determined by an additional draw held after the semi-final draw.

Statistics

Statistics exclude qualifying rounds and play-off round.

Top goalscorers

Source:

Top assists

Source:

Squad of the season

The UEFA technical study group selected the following 18 players as the squad of the tournament.