Stephen Halliday: For Scotland it’s scraps off the European table

ONLY Beram Kayal truly knows whether he ducked or slipped last Wednesday night when Arda Turan’s shot soared over him and proved too hot for Fraser Forster to handle as Atletico Madrid plundered three Europa League points from Parkhead.

What Celtic’s Israeli international midfielder was almost certainly unaware of was the significance of the result for his homeland. For Wednesday night saw Scotland slide down the Uefa co-efficient table another humbling notch as they were overtaken by Israel in the list.

Earlier in the season it was Cyprus, another nation with a negligible pedigree in European club competition, who moved above Scotland in the rankings which determine how many representatives a country has in the Champions League and Europa League and at which stage they enter the tournaments.

But for Celtic’s re-admission to the second tier competition this season, their play-off round conquerors Sion ejected for fielding ineligible players, Scotland would have experienced its worst collective campaign in Europe yet, with all of its clubs eliminated before the end of August.

While Neil Lennon and his players are doing their best to make the most of their reprieve, it is long odds against Celtic winning on Italian soil for the first time in their history in 10 days’ time to reach the knockout phase.

So for Scotland, now down in a 12-year low placing of 18th in the Uefa rankings, things could get even worse. The four nations directly below Scotland in the current list are Czech Republic, Croatia, Poland and Romania. Of the quartet, only Croatia cannot overtake Scotland this season as their sole remaining team, Dinamo Zagreb, will definitely finish bottom of their Champions League group.

The other three, however, have Scotland firmly in their sights. Viktoria Plzen, the Czech champions, are well placed to drop out of the Champions League into the last 32 of the Europa League.

From Poland, Legia Warsaw have secured their place in the Europa League knockout phase, while Wisla Krakow are in contention, too.

Romania also have two clubs, Vaslui and Steaua Bucharest, who go into the final round of Europa League group fixtures with a chance of progress.

This season’s rankings will determine the access list for the 2013-14 season and the likelihood is that Scotland’s champions will have to negotiate three qualifying rounds to reach the group stage of the Champions League, while the three teams in the Europa League will all also face three qualifiers.

Next season, when the SPL winners and runners-up will enter the Champions League in the third qualifying round, looks set to be the last for some considerable time that Scotland has two representatives in the elite tournament. On recent evidence, it is difficult to form a persuasive case that either of them will be able to make it to the serious part of the competition.

It can only be hoped that Celtic at least temporarily buck the trend of decline in continental competition for Scotland by sourcing a famous victory against Udinese next week. But even if they do, they are likely to be simply postponing a dispiriting period on the periphery of European football which sees them sharing the same status as clubs from Lithuania, Ireland and Moldova.