{"id":251026,"date":"2025-07-09T14:57:08","date_gmt":"2025-07-09T14:57:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/251026\/"},"modified":"2025-07-09T14:57:08","modified_gmt":"2025-07-09T14:57:08","slug":"crystal-palaces-europa-league-hopes-dealt-blow-after-lyon-win-relegation-appeal-soccer","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/251026\/","title":{"rendered":"Crystal Palace\u2019s Europa League hopes dealt blow after Lyon win relegation appeal | Soccer"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"dcr-16w5gq9\">Crystal Palace\u2019s hopes of playing in next season\u2019s Europa League appear to have been dealt a major blow after Lyon overturned their <a href=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/football\/2025\/jun\/24\/lyon-relegated-to-ligue-2-over-financial-problems\" data-link-name=\"in body link\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">relegation to Ligue 2<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p class=\"dcr-16w5gq9\">The seven-time French champions\u2019 demotion over financial issues was imposed last month by the country\u2019s football\u2019s watchdog, the DNCG. But Lyon, who are owned by John Textor\u2019s Eagle Football Holdings, have earned a reprieve after an appeal hearing in Paris on Wednesday and are expected to take up their place in next season\u2019s <a href=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/football\/uefa-europa-league\" data-link-name=\"in body link\" data-component=\"auto-linked-tag\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Europa League<\/a> after finishing sixth last season.<\/p>\n<p class=\"dcr-16w5gq9\">The French football federation said in a statement that the decision by the DNCG\u2019s appeal commission \u201cinvalidates the administrative relegation\u201d and allowed for Lyon\u2019s wage bill and transfer spend to be monitored.<\/p>\n<p>Quick GuideHow do I sign up for sport breaking news alerts?Show<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Download the Guardian app from the iOS App Store on iPhone or the Google Play store on Android by searching for &#8216;The Guardian&#8217;.<\/li>\n<li>If you already have the Guardian app, make sure you\u2019re on the most recent version.<\/li>\n<li>In the Guardian app, tap the Menu button at the bottom right, then go to Settings (the gear icon), then Notifications.<\/li>\n<li>Turn on sport notifications.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>Thank you for your feedback.<\/p>\n<p class=\"dcr-16w5gq9\">That is likely to have a major ramifications on Uefa\u2019s decision on whether Palace, who qualified for the Europa League by winning the FA Cup, will be cleared to participate in Europe after a ruling was delayed last week pending the outcome of Lyon\u2019s appeal.<\/p>\n<p class=\"dcr-16w5gq9\">Clubs are barred from competing in the same Uefa competition if an individual or ownership group is considered to have a decisive influence over more than one of those teams. Textor remains Palace\u2019s largest shareholder but the US businessman recently <a href=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/football\/2025\/jun\/23\/woody-johnson-signs-deal-to-buy-john-textor-shares-crystal-palace\" data-link-name=\"in body link\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">agreed a deal to sell his Palace shares<\/a> to the New York Jets owner, Woody Johnson. The former US ambassador to the UK must pass the Premier League\u2019s owners\u2019 and directors\u2019 test before he can complete the purchase but it is understood that is nearing completion.<\/p>\n<p class=\"dcr-16w5gq9\">Uefa sources have indicated that its Club Financial Control Body (CFCB), which investigates alleged breaches of its multi-club ownership rules, is due to decide on Palace\u2019s fate this week. With Lyon, who were fined \u20ac12.5m (\u00a310.8m) by Uefa for a breach of financial sustainability requirements last week, having been cleared by Uefa to play in European competition if they were reinstated to France\u2019s top flight, Palace\u2019s prospects of joining Aston Villa as the Premier League\u2019s representatives in the competition won by Tottenham last season appear slim.<\/p>\n<p class=\"dcr-16w5gq9\">There is a chance that they could be demoted to the Conference League, with Nottingham Forest taking Palace\u2019s place in the Europa League. Palace, who have never played in a major European competition, are expected to appeal to the court of arbitration for sport if they are barred from the Europa League. Last month <a href=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/football\/2025\/jun\/05\/crystal-palace-europe-place-uefa-rejects-owners-blind-trust-move\" data-link-name=\"in body link\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Uefa rejected attempts<\/a> from Textor and his Palace co-owner David Blitzer, the majority shareholder at Danish side Br\u00f8ndby, to put their shares in a blind trust after they missed the 1 March deadline.<\/p>\n<p class=\"dcr-16w5gq9\">Textor announced last week that he had resigned from his leadership roles at Lyon, with Michael Gerlinger appointed as the chief executive and Michele Kang \u2013 who owns Washington Spirit and London City Lionesses and bought Lyon\u2019s extremely successful women\u2019s team from Eagle Football Holdings last year \u2013 as the chair and president. She is understood to have led Lyon\u2019s appeal, with reports in France saying the club have agreed on an \u201causterity plan\u201d designed to stabilise its finances after being asked to inject up to \u20ac200m to keep the club in <a href=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/football\/ligue1football\" data-link-name=\"in body link\" data-component=\"auto-linked-tag\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Ligue 1<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p><a data-ignore=\"global-link-styling\" href=\"#EmailSignup-skip-link-9\" class=\"dcr-jzxpee\">skip past newsletter promotion<\/a><\/p>\n<p class=\"dcr-1sbse14\">Sign up to Football Daily<\/p>\n<p class=\"dcr-1xjndtj\">Kick off your evenings with the Guardian&#8217;s take on the world of football<\/p>\n<p><strong>Privacy Notice: <\/strong>Newsletters may contain info about charities, online ads, and content funded by outside parties. For more information see our <a data-ignore=\"global-link-styling\" href=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/help\/privacy-policy\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" class=\"dcr-1rjy2q9\" target=\"_blank\">Privacy Policy<\/a>. We use Google reCaptcha to protect our website and the Google <a data-ignore=\"global-link-styling\" href=\"https:\/\/policies.google.com\/privacy\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" class=\"dcr-1rjy2q9\" target=\"_blank\">Privacy Policy<\/a> and <a data-ignore=\"global-link-styling\" href=\"https:\/\/policies.google.com\/terms\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" class=\"dcr-1rjy2q9\" target=\"_blank\">Terms of Service<\/a> apply.<\/p>\n<p id=\"EmailSignup-skip-link-9\" tabindex=\"0\" aria-label=\"after newsletter promotion\" role=\"note\" class=\"dcr-jzxpee\">after newsletter promotion<\/p>\n<p class=\"dcr-16w5gq9\">Kang was pictured meeting the French sports minister, Marie Barsacq, on Tuesday evening in a move widely interpreted as a positive sign before their hearing.<\/p>\n<p class=\"dcr-16w5gq9\">The club said in a statement: \u201cOlympique Lyonnais welcomes today\u2019s decision from the DNCG which restores our position in Ligue 1 and is grateful that the appeal commission recognises the ambition of the club\u2019s new management to ensure a professionalised administration of its affairs going forward.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Crystal Palace\u2019s hopes of playing in next season\u2019s Europa League appear to have been dealt a major blow&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":251027,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4100],"tags":[94,79,16,15],"class_list":{"0":"post-251026","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-football","8":"tag-football","9":"tag-sports","10":"tag-uk","11":"tag-united-kingdom"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/114823866055610423","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/251026","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=251026"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/251026\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/251027"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=251026"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=251026"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=251026"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}