Which football teams have won tournaments they did not qualify for?

“Apart from Denmark in 1992, have any teams won tournaments or competitions for which they didn’t originally qualify?” enquires John Palfreyman.

It’s Europa League week, so let’s start with the teams who won that competition after going out of the Champions League. (Yes, yes, we know that technically they qualified but they still got there via the back door and the parachute. The definition of ‘didn’t originally qualify’ is in the eye of the beholder so we’ve included any potentially eligible story we find vaguely interesting, which is basically all of them.)

“This has happened on nine occasions,” writes Jim Hearson. “Galatasaray started the fun at the turn of the millennium, and were subsequently followed by Feyenoord, CSKA Moscow, Shakhtar Donetsk, Chelsea, Atlético Madrid (twice) and, of course, the #EuropaMen of Sevilla, who repeated the trick in 2016 and 2023.

“It’s happened once in the Conference League too - just last season, in fact - when Olympiacos dropped out of the Europa League before going on to clinch Europe’s tertiary competition.”

Sevilla also won the Europa League in unusual circumstances in 2013-14. “They finished ninth in La Liga in 2012-13,” begins Dirk Maas. “However, Málaga (who came sixth) and Rayo Vallecano (eighth) were barred from playing in Europe for financial reasons.”

Dirk has two other cases from European football. “Dinamo Tbilisi won the 1980-81 Cup Winners’ Cup, famously thrashing West Ham at Upton Park en route, but technically they shouldn’t have been in the competition: they were beaten in the Soviet Cup final by Shakhtar Donetsk. But the final took place in August, after the Uefa deadline, and Shakhtar – who finished above Dinamo in the league – had already been awarded a Uefa Cup place.”

The other is Perugia, who were one of the three winners of the 2003 Intertoto Cup. They had only finished 10th in Serie A but took part when Chievo turned down their invitation.

The Intertoto Cup is small beer compared to the next story. “Atlético Madrid are the only team who have been champions of the world but not Europe,” writes Ruben. “They lost the final of the European Cup in 1974 to Bayern Munich but went on to win the Intercontinental Cup (defeating Copa Libertadores winner Independiente) the following year after Bayern declined to participate. And though some other European Cup runners-up have appeared in the Intercontinental Cup (eg Borussia Mönchengladbach in 1977 and Milan), Atléti are the only team to win it.

“Atlético also played an inadvertent part in Sir Bobby Robson’s finest hour as manager of FC Barcelona. They did the double in 1995-96, beating Johan Cruyff’s Barça in the Copa del Rey final; Barça thus qualified for the Cup Winners’ Cup and, armed with a new manager and a new signing called Ronaldo, went all the way. The other teams to win the Cup Winners’ Cup after losing their domestic cup final are Fiorentina (1960-61), Rangers (1971-72) and Anderlecht (1977-78).

“A couple of Uefa Cup winners also only qualified because of a result in their domestic cup final. Bayer Leverkusen (1987-88) finished sixth in the Bundesliga the previous season and were only given a Uefa Cup spot when Hamburg (second) beat second-tier team Stuttgart Kickers in the cup final.

“The same thing happened to plucky Bayern Munich. They came sixth in the Bundesliga in 1994-95 – imagine – but were given a Uefa Cup place when Borussia Mönchengladbach (fifth) beat second-tier Wolfsburg in the final. With their new signing Jürgen Klinsmann scoring an obscene 15 goals, Bayern won the Uefa Cup.

Thanks to Ruben for these examples, and a thorough list of smaller competitions in Europe and South America that were were won by non-qualifiers.

• Copa Interamericana Universidad Católica (1993), Atlético Nacional (1995)

• Copa de Oro Flamengo (1996)

• Copa Conmebol Talleres (1999)

There are some more tales on the Lucky Losers page of the marvellous RSSSF.

And finally, an example from international football that doesn’t involve Peter Schmeichel and John Jensen. “West Germany won the 1981 Fifa World Youth Championship (now called the Under-20 World Cup),” tweets Ben Janeson, “having only qualified because of the Netherlands’ withdrawal.”

Hard to beat (and lose to)

Dumbarton’s run of draws ended at the weekend when they lost 1-0 at home to Montrose. Nobody has been able to top a record of P6 W0 D6 L0 but Chris Roe has a couple of similar examples from England.

First up, Stockport County in 1973-74. Their sequence of results is worth listing: 1-1, 1-1, 1-1, 1-1, 2-2, 1-1, 0-4, 1-1, 1-1. Seven 1-1 draws in the first nine league games. Frustrating as hell for all connected with the club, but preferable to what followed: they lost 19 of the last 37 games to finish bottom of Division Four.

The other case was in the top flight in 1976-77. Jimmy Bloomfield’s Leicester City, who had drawn 19 games the previous season, including six of the first seven, went one better by drawing all of their first six league games.

They lost the seventh, 2-0 away to Aston Villa, but their season turned out a little better than Stockport’s. Thanks mainly to the goals of Frank Worthington and Steve Earle, Leicester finished safely in mid-table.

Every loser wins (II)

In last week’s Knowledge we looked at teams who had celebrated defeat and/or relegation with an open-top bus tour. As ever, there’s more.

“Newcastle have history with this,” writes Russell Hughes. “There’s BBC archive footage from 1974.” Newcastle were well beaten, 3-0 by Liverpool, but were welcomed home with such affection that their goalkeeper Iam McFaul was reduced to tears.

Knowledge archive

“Juventus have drawn their last three Serie A games 0-0,” notes Bogdan Kotarlic. “Which team played in the most consecutive goalless draws?”

We had this question back in 2017. Here’s what we said then.

Can you help?

“The long-running comedy series that is Heart of Midlothian FC continued when they sacked Steven Naismith on Sunday following a 2-1 defeat by St Mirren. The two permanent managers before Naismith, Robbie Neilson and Daniel Stendel, were also sacked after defeats to St Mirren. Is a team taking out three consecutive managers a record?” wonders Tom Ball.

“In the first two knockout rounds of the Scottish League Cup, all 12 ties were won by the home side,” notes Stuart McLagan. “Is there a precedent for this kind of collective failure of visiting teams?”

“Has anyone scored hat-tricks in the same fixture for both teams?” wonders Masai Graham.

“Arsenal’s Myles Lewis-Skelly was booked at before his first appearance for the club. Any other instances of this?” asks DW.

“The recent match between Aston Villa and Everton included six players who have appeared for both clubs (Ashley Young, Idrissa Gueye, Ross Barkley, Lucas Digne, Amadou Onana and Tim Iroegbunam). Is this a Premier League record?” wonders Rory Walsh.

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