The battle between England and Germany for an extra spot in next season's Champions League could well be decided over the coming days. Amid the hope of the Premier League obtaining a fifth place at Europe's top table in the 2024/25 campaign, it is the Bundesliga who are in the driving seat at present ahead of the semi-finals of UEFA's three club competitions getting underway.

Italy have already sewn up an extra Champions League place for next season via the European Performance Spots, thus leaving England and Germany to go head-to-head for the second and final spot. For Ange Postecoglou and Tottenham, they will be hoping there is a late twist in the tale as they currently sit fifth in the Premier League table with five games remaining.

The Lilywhites do have two games in hand to play over Aston Villa in fourth but the current seven-point deficit could be too much to overcome in what remains of the season. As things stand heading into the latest round of European games, Italy top the European Performance Spots with a current coefficient score of 19.428, Germany are on 17.928 and England make up the top three with their score of 17.375.

The European Performance Spots are calculated by UEFA adding up coefficient points based on the performances of clubs across UEFA's three club competitions. A win is worth two points, a draw gets one point and no points are awarded for a defeat.

Teams are also awarded additional bonus points for how far they progress in a competition. Although the points did differ slightly in the group stage of the three competitions, reaching the semi-final of either of the three is worth a single point.

Once all the points are added up they are then divided by the number of clubs who started the season in UEFA's competitions to calculate the coefficient average. As England started with eight teams in Europe compared to Germany's seven, each win is worth slightly less to the coefficient.

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All Germany need to do in the remaining games of this season's three UEFA club competitions is to achieve 0.488 coefficient points to earn a fifth Champions League berth. They could very well do that over the next week with Bayern Munich and Borussia Dortmund playing in the Champions League and Bayer Leverkusen taking part in the Europa League.

Two wins would be enough to see them come out on top and the same goes for a win and two draws. In the Champions League, Bayern Munich face Real Madrid over two legs and Borussia Dortmund take on PSG.

Bayer Leverkusen are the current favourites to win the Europa League but they do face a tricky semi-final showdown against Roma. Xabi Alonso's side have enjoyed an extraordinary season that has seen them win the Bundesliga and not lost a single game across all three competitions.

For whoever finishes fifth in the Premier League - currently Tottenham - to qualify for next season's Champions League instead of the Europa League, a lot would need to happen with Aston Villa playing a major role in that. Unai Emery's team would need to lift the Europa Conference League trophy in Athens at the end of the month, winning both legs of the semi-final to help the Premier League close in on the Bundesliga.

The Midlands club face Olympiacos over two legs in the semi-finals and they would then play one of Fiorentina or Club Brugge if they do manage to reach the final of the competition. Even if Villa do win all three of their games, the Premier League would still be reliant on the German sides enduring a horrendous set of semi-final results just to give them an outside chance of an extra Champions League place.

If Tottenham do want to be playing in Europe's premier competition from September onwards, all Postecoglou's team can do right now to guarantee it is overhaul Aston Villa in their final five games and finish the season in the top four.

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