A good week for English (and Welsh!) clubs in Europe

It's been a pretty good week for English clubs in Europe.

Manchester City secured qualification with a 5-2 win over CSKA Moscow, but they will probably go through as runners-up to Bayern Munich so the second round draw will need to be kind to them.

Arsenal had a fantastic 1-0 win at Borussia Dortmund, a win that will go a long way to putting them through to the knock-out stages out of a group with three good teams (add Napoli to these two). Aaron Ramsey's excellent scoring record for the season continued with his winning header.

Chelsea have recovered superbly after their shock defeat in the first group match against FC Basel. Their latest win, 3-0 against Shalke '04, pushed them to the brink of qualification.

Manchester United's rather dull 0-0 draw put them top of their group with eight points and another win will see them through. Steady, if unspectacular, progress.

In the Europa Cup, Tottenham Hotspur ensured that they will progress to the second round with a 2-1 win over Sheriff Tiraspol from Moldova. Six wins out of six (including two qualification games) - often with understrength teams - is evidence of a fine European campaign to date.

Wigan Athletic's loss at Rubin Kazan (Russia) leaves them with five points in second place, but work still to do in their final two group games.

Wales's Swansea City got a 1-1 draw at Kuban Krasnodar and they have eight points to date. Second behind Valencia in their group, another two points will certainly see them through (and one, or even none, might be enough!).

All round, an excellent week for teams from the English League in Europe.

What's the Europa League all about?

The bloated new Europa League limps on. Starting with an unbelievable 162 clubs from every corner of Europe, it has now been reduced to 48 clubs, grouped in 12 groups of four. Only two games into the six-game groups, it's already tiring even the most avid football-watchers.

After the group stages the 12 winners and 12 runners-up will be joined by the eight third-placed teams from the Champions League to create a final 32. This farce of adding some form of "best losers" from another competition only serves to devalue the Europa Cup further. Why stop at the third-placed teams from the Champions League groups? Surely the losers from the round of 16, the quarter-finals or semi-finals are more deserving of a place? Why not just put the losing Champions League finalists straight into the Europa League final? I'm being silly? Hey, UEFA started it!

Nor do I quite understand the apparent obsessive desire of English clubs to get into Europe when many of them then do their best to get straight out again! Aston Villa managed it in the qualifying rounds this year, having frustratingly qualified out of their group last season (luckily, they got knocked out in the first knock-out stage by playing a weakened team in Moscow!).

Last night Fulham made five changes and Everton were "without" 10 first-teamers.

What's the point?

Extra officials for the Europa League

Two more assistant referees were introduced into games in the Europa League last night (the Europa League is this season's replacement for the UEFA Cup and is a copy of the Champions League format).

It means there are now five officials helping to make decisions on the game, plus of course the 'fourth' official - now the sixth official!

The two additional assistant referees stand at each end, behind the goal line to the goalkeeper's right. Their duties are to help the referee rule on incidents in the penalty box. It could be an arduous duty for them on a cold winter's night in a dour midfield battle in Moscow, but a sound overcoat in fetching eggshell blue should do the trick.

Whether they will help cut down on shirt-tugging and the like in the box only time will tell, and one round of games is certainly too soon to make a judgement.

(Picture courtesy of TimesOnline)