After Calamity in Almaty – It’s Europa League slow lane for Celtic

Despite being heavy favourites for the two-legged playoff against the Kazakh champions, Celtic were beaten last night and will enter Europe’s second-tier club competition for the first time in four years.

Celtic’s exit in the final stage of Champions League qualifying means they will take part in the Europa League’s new 36-team league format.

The Europa League draw is scheduled for Friday, 29 August, with proceedings starting at 12pm Celtic Park time. The draw seedings will be finalised tomorrow night once all fixtures are completed.

The Europa League’s league stage takes place between 24 September, 2025, and 29 January, 2026, during which Celtic are scheduled to play eight games, four at home and four away.

The Europa League matchday dates are as follows:

Matchday 1: 24-25 September 2025
Matchday 2: 2 October 2025
Matchday 3: 23 October 2025
Matchday 4: 6 November 2025
Matchday 5: 27 November 2025
Matchday 6: 11 December 2025
Matchday 7: 22 January 2026
Matchday 8: 29 January 2026

Projected pots as per Football Rankings on X are as follows:

Pot 1: Roma, Porto, theRangers , Feyenoord, Lille, Dinamo Zagreb, Real Betis, Salzburg and Aston Villa.

Pot 2: Fenerbahce, Braga, Crvena Zvezda, Lyon, Viktoria Plzen, Ferencvaros, Celtic, Maccabi Tel-Aviv and Young Boys.

Pot 3: Basel, Midtjylland, Freiburg, Ludogorets, Nottingham Forest, Sturm Graz, FSCB, Nice and Bologna.

Pot 4: Celta Vigo, Stuttgart, Panathinaikos, Malmo, Go Ahead Eagles, Utrecht, Rijeka, Genk and Brann.

Similarly to the Champions League format last season, if Celtic secure a place in the top eight, they will progress straight to the round of 16, while a finish between ninth and 24th would send them into the knockout play-off stage. 25th and below would send the Hoops out of European competition.

The knockout play-offs are set for 19 and 26 February, 2026, followed by the round of 16 on 12 and 19 March.

Quarter-finals take place on 9 and 16 April, with the semi-finals on 30 April and  7 May. The competition concludes with the final in Istanbul on 20 May, 2026.

Celtic must now shift focus back to the Scottish Premiership, with Rodgers’ men preparing for the first Glasgow Derby of the season against theRangers at Ibrox on Sunday, which is Celtic’s last chance to win a match against the latest Ibrox club in 2025.

The Celtic Board will release information on Europa League ticket prices in due course. Stay tuned…

Conor Spence