The Eagles facing demotion to the Conference League?

Crystal Palace Punished.

It’s only been two months since the football world rejoiced at Crystal Palace’s historic FA Cup triumph, after beating Pep Guardiola’s Manchester City 1-0 at Wembley. As a result they booked their place in the UEFA Europa League, and the eager Eagles were looking forward to major European football at Selhurst Park for the first time in their history. But as of the 11th of July, UEFA announced that they would be demoted to the Europa Conference League following a UEFA Club Financial Control Body ruling. This comes as a shock to many and has left fans wondering how the club is going to react, and how this will affect their aspirations for the upcoming season?

So what rules have they breached? The club was deemed to have been in violation of UEFA’s multi-club ownership rules, specifically Article 5 of UEFA’s Club Competition Regulations. A major Crystal Palace shareholder John Textor, who has an approximately 43% share of Eagle Football holdings, also had holdings of 77% in French Ligue 1 side Olympique Lyonnais. Textor no longer has a 43% stake in Crystal Palace, after selling it in an effort to prevent the ban, but this occurred after the deadline of March 1st 2025, and UEFA deemed it to still be in breach of their rules. Lyon also qualified for the Europa League this season by finishing sixth in Ligue 1, but had initially been facing relegation from Ligue 1 due to domestic financial breaches until a successful appeal which overturned this decision on July 9th. Because the Lyon side finished higher than Crystal Palace in their domestic league, they have been given priority to qualify ahead of the Eagles.

The club has since launched an appeal of their own to the Court of Arbitration for Sport, but there have already been other cases this season of qualified clubs being kicked out of European competition for breach of the same rules. Irish outfit Drogheda United – owned by Trivela Group, which also held a controlling stake in Danish side Silkeborg IF – have been ejected from the competition. Slovakian side DAC 1904 Dunajská Streda have also faced the boot, so this won’t fill Palace fans with confidence that their appeal will be accepted.

Crystal Palace manager Oliver Glasner famously won the 2022 Europa League with Frankfurt and has a consistent track record of performing in Europe. People wouldn’t have bet against Palace making a deep run in the competition, especially if they manage to keep a hold of key players like Eberechi Eze, Marc Guehi and Jean-Philippe Mateta. Their style of play under Glasner does work well in knockout football, as we’ve seen with just how impressive they were in their 24/25 FA Cup campaign. Their ability to attack with emphasis on fast vertical transitions by overloading the field out wide through their wing-backs, dragging opponents out and exploiting the space left behind through switches, works very well in one-off games.

Undoubtedly, the people who are hardest hit by this ruling are the Crystal Palace fans. They have just witnessed their club qualify on merit into one of the most prestigious European competitions around, and now face having it taken away as a result of something completely out of their hands. Many have questioned the integrity of UEFA’s rules, as we have had examples in the past of clubs who seemingly look to have been in breach of Multi-Club ownership rules, but have got around it through finding loopholes to comply with regulations. Notably Manchester City and Girona FC, who are both owned by City Football Group (CFG), qualified for the Champions League in the 24/25 season, but CFG managed to reduce their stake and relinquished board control to get around it. RB Leipzig and FC Salzburg – both of whom had been previously owned by Red Bull – actually found themselves competing in the same group in the 18/19 Europa League. The company sold its shares and renamed Red Bull Salzburg as “FC Salzburg” – they were kept on officially as the club’s shirt sponsor only and UEFA deemed this acceptable. Given the fact that John Textor has done essentially the same thing by selling his shares of the club in an attempt to comply, people are wondering how this is any different?

Now, how would change actually affect the club performance-wise for the upcoming season? On the one hand, undoubtedly, if they do end up in the Conference League then they will be one of the favourites to win the competition. The last two out of three winners have hailed from the Premier League and there is an astronomical difference in the budget of the PL clubs in comparison to the rest of the European sides that form the competition. On the other hand, the drop into a less prestigious competition could be the deciding factor in turning a few players' heads to move away from Selhurst Park – such as Eze, who’s already reportedly heavily linked with a move to Arsenal, and Marc Guehi, who’s had reports that a potential move to Liverpool could be on the cards. This could only mean a tougher challenge when competing in the league next season, which just seems to be getting stronger and stronger. Although, at the end of the day, if we flash forward in a year's time and Crystal Palace have just lifted the Conference League trophy in Leipzig, this will surely be a distant memory and maybe a blessing in disguise.