Crystal Palace's Europa League hopes hit by Lyon's successful Ligue 1 appeal

Palace are likely to lose the spot in the UEL.

Nottingham Forest are probably going to take Crystal Palace’s place in the UEFA Europa League, while Crystal Palace will be “demoted” to the UEFA Conference League.

Lyon, a French team, declared Wednesday afternoon that they had successfully appealed their Ligue 1 relegation.

If the ruling had been upheld, Palace, the FA Cup winners, would have qualified for the second-tier UEFA competition the following season.

Due to UEFA’s regulations on multi-club ownership, the south London team will now likely be “relegated” to the third-tier competition. Palace executives travelled to UEFA headquarters last month to make their case, as reported by Mail Sport.

As per the competition’s rules, if one person is in charge of plenty of clubs, which qualify for the same European tournament, the club that finishes top of their respective league takes the spot.

The fact that John Textor, a US billionaire whose Eagle Football Holdings owns the majority of the team, also owns the majority of Lyon was Palace’s problem. Lyon technically will take the Europa League spot since they finished sixth, while Palace came in 12th.

Palace had maintained that Textor had no say in how the team was operated, and he later sold Woody Johnson his 43% ownership for £190 million.

However, they ended up in an institutional nightmare because they did not act to remove Textor from the club before UEFA’s March 1 deadline.

After Lyon were demoted for violating French financial regulations, Palace had optimism. But as their appeal is granted, Selhurst Park fans will feel devastated.

Who could take Palace’s spot in UEL?

Forest, who were in the third-tier UEFA competition, will presumably be promoted to the second-tier UEFA competition and essentially replace Palace as a result. Officials from UEFA will now convene before a decision is announced.

A Lyon statement said: ‘’Olympique Lyonnais welcomes today’s decision by the DNCG to keep the Club in Ligue 1.” 

”OL thanks the Appeals Committee for recognizing the ambition of the Club’s new management, determined to ensure serious management in the future.‘’

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