I had a great conversation with Jonathan Starling of the Third Half podcast last week. We discussed the upcoming UEFA Cup group stage, UEFA’s stance on debt-laden clubs, the situation at Ajax and many other topics.

I’ve posted the Champions League Talk segment of the show here as a separate podcast file but if you’d like to hear the full show (which has segments with writers from Bundesliga Talk, La Liga Talk and Major League Soccer Talk), please download it from EPL Talk podcast distribution site or subscribe to the EPL Talk podcast feed via iTunes.

UEFA held the draw for the UEFA Cup group stage today and some fascinating pairings emerged. Both Martin Jol and Steve McClaren will take their new clubs back to England as FC Twente will face Manchester City and Jol’s Hamburg will take on Aston Villa.

This year’s groups are looking really tough and the field contains eight former UEFA Cup winners, and six former European Champion Clubs’ Cup/UEFA Champions League winners.

The top three teams in each group qualify for the knockout stages, to be joined by the eight third-placed teams in the Champions League groups. Here are the groupings with my picks to advance. A couple of potential upsets are on the cards. I think Ajax might not make the Round of 32 with their form being so inconsistent. They’ve been drawn in with some very good teams and it’s going to be tight to see who goes on.

Potential for upset exists in Groups B and E as well where Olympiakos and Portsmouth might struggle. Portsmouth have had a poor start to the season and are looking shaky at the back. Olympiacos are simply in a tough group and may struggle to beat out Hertha Berlin, Benfica and Galatasaray (a team featuring ex-Liverpool attackers Harry Kewell and Milan Baros).

I’ve picked Rosenborg to advance as they are nearing the end of their season and should be in good form/shape and as they are not likely to win their domestic league, they will look to these games to give their season some positivity.

Group A:
Schalke 04 (Germany)
Paris St Germain (France)
Manchester City (England)
Racing Santander (Spain)
FC Twente (Netherlands)

Group B:
Benfica (Portugal)
Hertha Berlin (Germany)
Galatasaray (Turkey)
Olympiacos (Greece)
Metalist Kharkiv (Ukraine)

Group C:
Sevilla (Spain)
VfB Stuttgart (Germany)
Sampdoria (Italy)
Standard Liège (Belgium)
Partizan Belgrade (Serbia)

Group D:
Spartak Moscow (Russia)
Udinese (Italy)
Dinamo Zagreb (Croatia)
Tottenham Hotspur (England)
NEC Nijmegen (Netherlands)

Group E:
AC Milan (Italy)
SC Braga (Portugal)
Wolfsburg (Germany)
Heerenveen (Netherlands)
Portsmouth (England)

Group F:
Hamburg (Germany)
Aston Villa (England)
Slavia Prague (Czech Republic)
Ajax (Netherlands)
MSK Zilina (Slovakia)

Group G:
Valencia (Spain)
FC Copenhagen (Denmark)
Rosenborg (Norway)
Club Brugge (Belgium)
St Etienne (France)

Group H:
CSKA Moscow (Russia)
Deportivo La Coruna (Spain)
Feyenoord (Netherlands)
AS Nancy (France)
Lech Poznan (Poland)

As we reported on a number of weeks ago, the UEFA Executive Committee has finalized the change in name of the UEFA Cup to the UEFA Europa League starting in the 2009-10 season. Along with the new name come major changes to the competition, which will feature a 48-team group stage.

Changes to the name, logo and brand identity of the competition are seen by UEFA as the next logical step following the decision to alter the format of the UEFA Cup and create a true group stage, with both home and away matches. That decision was made back in December 2007 so this is not an overnight decision.

UEFA’s ambition in making all these changes is to rejuvenate the competition that has fallen into the shadows of the massive success of the Champions League. The UEFA Cup, which was introduced in 1971-72 season and replaced the Inter Cities Fairs Cup, has been the only European club competition other than the Champions League since the Cup Winners’ Cup was dropped in 1999. The fact that clubs who have failed to survive the group stage of the Champions League continue in the UEFA Cup has contributed to its perception as a second-rate event and the general perception is still that the ‘big clubs’ will be in the Champions League.

However, I think the UEFA Cup/Europa League is an important and often underrated competition. While perhaps not as prestigious as the Champions League, it does offer other clubs a vehicle to earn extra revenue and gain experience playing against clubs outside their domestic league. It seems to be mostly the mainstream media and a large number of bloggers that trash the UEFA Cup as meaningless but those same outlets are generally only focused on the so-called “glamour” clubs.

I think if you ask fans of the clubs involved in the UEFA Cup, they are happy to be there and competing for a trophy. There have been some great matches in the UEFA Cup including last season’s final and semi-final involving Zenit St Petersburg. That club is a prime example of what this competition can do for a ‘smaller’ club that is looking to advance itself.

This is a bit late but I did want to acknowledge that UEFA.com has re-launched with a new take on their familiar look. The layout is a bit cleaner though the page now contains more elements. The color scheme is basic white and black though the newly launched photo gallery adds plenty of color.

I’d be interested to hear your thoughts on the new site. Do you find it easier to track down the information you are after? Are there features you think UEFA are missing the boat on?

Reuters reports that UEFA is considering changing the name of its second tier UEFA Cup competition to the UEFA Europa League or the Europa Cup. The planned rebranding was revealed by Bayern Munich chief executive Karl-Heinz Rummenigge, also the acting chairman of the new European Clubs Association, The European Clubs Assocation was presented with the proposal on Monday.

Rummenigge alluded to the general impression that maintains that the UEFA Cup is a second-class competition . Despite the fact that it is often more exciting and more unpredictable than the Champions League, casual football fans choose to turn their nose up at the UEFA Cup simply because the ‘big clubs’ are not involved rather than judging the quality of football on offer. However, the thinking is that a fresh start for the competition and more aggressive marketing might net UEFA more dollars in terms of advertising and TV deals.

The name change will likely be brought in at the same time as the revamped format for the UEFA Cup takes hold as of the 2009-10 season. The new group stage will directly copy the format of the Champions League.

I don’t want to be a stodgy traditionalist and I am in favour of the group stage changes but I have to admit that I’m initially not impressed with the proposed name change. Europa League? It just doesn’t carry the excitement of a name like Champions League. One thing for sure is that it will certainly take a while before people stop calling it the UEFA Cup or ‘competition formerly known as the UEFA Cup’.

What’s your take on the proposed name change? Feel free to post alternate name ideas and/or your suggestions for improving the competition.

Eleven UEFA Cup second qualifying round berths are up for grabs as the final UEFA Intertoto Cup competition began this past weekend.

The Intertoto Cup was launched in 1961 as a means of generating money for football pools companies in the summer off-season. It came under UEFA’s jurisdiction in 1995 and was turned into an alternative qualifying route into the UEFA Cup. The tournament also allowed clubs who had not qualified for the UEFA Champions League or UEFA Cup to experience European club football.

The revamping of the European club competitions starting in the 2009/10 season will mark the end of the Intertoto Cup. Bordeaux’s feat of reaching the 1995/96 UEFA Cup final is thus far the best run of any Intertoto Cup winner. Last season’s outright winners of the Intertoto Cup (determined by their UEFA Cup performance), Hamburger SV, did the best of the eleven qualifiers by progressing to the UEFA Cup Round of 16.

In this final run of the competition, 11 teams from the Intertoto Cup will go on to enter the second qualifying round of the UEFA Cup. Clubs from higher ranked national associations such as Norway and Scotland will enter at the second round of UEFA Cup qualifying. Hibernian are Scotland’s entry and Rosenborg are Norway’s entry. We’ll have more on both the Intertoto and UEFA Cup qualifying as things progress.

The first round of Intertoto play kicked off in style with two emphatic scorelines being put up. Swedish side Elfsborg downed Faroe Islands based club HB Tórshavn 4-1 and Irish club Bohemian FC defeated their Welsh opponents Rhyl FC by a score of 5-1.

Here are the rest of the weekend results:
FK Ekranas (Lithuania) 1-0 JK Trans Narva (Estonia)
Lisburn Distillery FC (Northern Ireland) 2-3 TPS Turku (Finland)
Hibernians (Malta) 0-3 Nova Gorica (Slovenia)
FC Mika (Armenia) 2-2 Tiraspol (Moldova)
Etzella Ettelbruck (Luxembourg) 0-0 Lokomotiv Tbilisi (Georgia)
FK Riga (Latvia) 1-2 Fylkir (Iceland)
Cracovia Krakow (Poland) 1-2 Shakhtyor Soligorsk (Belarus)
FK Neftchi (Azerbaijan) 2-0 Nitra (Slovakia)
NK Rijeka (Macedonia) 0-0 Renova (Croatia)
Celik Zenica (Bosnia-Herzegovina) 3-2 Grbalj Radanovici (Montenegro)
Besa (Albania) 0-0 Ethnikos Achnas (Cyprus)
FC Zhetysu Taldykorgan (Kazakhstan) 1-2 Budapest Honvéd FC (Hungary)