The wait is finally over and West Ham United will find out who their group stage opponents will be for this season’s Europa League.
UEFA will be starting the draw, which is being held in Istanbul, from 11am GMT and West Ham are in pot three of four pots of seeded teams.
Teams are divided into four pots based on their UEFA club coefficients. West Ham’s coefficient is 20.113 – putting the Hammers 19th in the seeded rankings.
West Ham are in pot three with Dimitri Payet’s Marseille, Manuel Pellegrini’s Real Betis, Fenerbahce, PSVM Ludogorets, David Moyes’s old club Real Sociedad and Spartak Moscow.
Being in pot three means West Ham are highly likely to face at least one of the top seeded sides in pot one. That includes Napoli, Dinamo Zagreb, Lyon, Bayer Leverkusen, West Ham’s Italian sister club Lazio, Hammers feeder club Slavia Prague, Monaco and Arthur Masuaku’s former club Olympiacos.
If West Ham make it to the final of the competition they will be playing for a place in next season’s Champions League at Seville’s Ramón Sánchez Pizjuán stadium.
How does the draw work?
- Final Ambassador Andrés Palop and special guest Marcos Senna – who starred for Villarreal under Pellegrini – will assist with the draw.
- One team from each of the four seeding pots will be drawn into the eight groups, A–H.
- No team can play a club from their own association meaning West Ham will not face Leicester – who the Hammers beat 4-1 last time out – in the group stage. Any other restrictions will be announced before the draw.
Will clubs be paired?
In the case of associations with two or more representatives, clubs may be ‘paired’ in order that they play at different kick-off times (5.45pm GMT and 8pm GMT) for the benefit of TV audiences. That means West Ham and Leicester’s matches may be staggered with one kicking off at 5.45pm and the other 8pm and vice versa.
If a ‘paired’ club is drawn, for example, in Group A, B, C or D then the other ‘paired’ club – once drawn – will automatically be assigned to the first available section out of Groups E, F, G or H.
When will fixtures be confirmed?
West Ham fans will learn the full fixture list for the group stage on Friday evening once UEFA has taken into account the calendars of participating clubs and stakeholders.
Matchday dates
1: 16 September
2: 30 September
3: 21 October
4: 4 November
5: 25 November
6: 9 December
How does the group stage work?
Teams in each group face each other home and away, with the same sides meeting on Matchdays 1 and 5, or Matchdays 2 and 6, or Matchdays 3 and 4.
The top three clubs will continue their European campaigns in the new year:
- Group winners progress to the round of 16.
- Group runners-up go into the new knockout round play-offs, where they will face the third-placed UEFA Champions League teams for places in the round of 16.
- Third-placed sides transfer to the UEFA Europa Conference League knockout round play-offs.
How can West Ham fans watch the draw?
The draw will be streamed live on UEFA.com.
And there will be live coverage of the draw as it happens on the likes of Sky Sports.
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