We hear it all the time in football…European football impacts a team in the Premier League the following weekend.
The cliche has already been banded around this season about Wolves after their domestic campaign got off to a stuttering start having taken part in the Europa League, and inevitably is is the continental competition that gets blamed.
We at Betting Directory thought it was high time that this theory was put to the test and find out exactly what impact the added games had on a team. Is it true that playing in the Champions League or the Europa League on a Wednesday or Thursday night makes the next Premier League game harder?
We found out…
Champions League And Europa League Stats
The boffins at Betting Directory have run the numbers for English sides competing in either the Champions League or Europa League since the 2009/10 season and the results are fascinating.
The data tells us that those English teams who have played in either European competition have won 52.7% of their following league fixtures, with 27.2% of matches lost and 20.1% drawn.
The stats go up slightly for the Champions League teams with 55% of their matches won directly after appearing in Europe’s premier competition, while that figure drops to 50.1% for the Europa League teams which does give some credence to the theory that Thursday night games have an adverse impact on teams.
Klopp And Pep Hot But Solskjaer Is Not
We also ran the numbers on a team-by-team and manager-by-manager basis and the numbers are both expected and startling at the same time.
Perhaps surprisingly it is Unai Emeri who tops the list of managers who have the highest win percentage in league fixtures following a European game, with the current Arsenal gaffer having a stunning 80.8% win rate. That stat must also reflect his time with Sevilla and as it stands he is clear of Sir Alex Ferguson (74.3%), Pep Guardiola (70%) and Jurgen Klopp (67.3%) among managers who have coached five European fixtures or more.
Unsurprisingly it is Ole Gunnar Solskjaer at the other end of the scale with the struggling Man United Manager winning just 12.5% of his Premier League games after a midweek European fixture, albeit with a small sample size.
Liverpool and Man City are dominating the Premier League at the moment and it is easy to see why when you consider how successful they have been in balancing domestic struggles with their European competition. Man City are the most successful team in their fixture after a Champions League match with their win percentage up at 60.7%, with Liverpool next best on 60.5%.
This is one cliche in football that we can now put official hard stats and it will be fascinating to see if the trend continues over the remainder of this season as the trophies are handed out, both on the continent and at home.