Europa League starts today with the League Phase, the first of eight matchdays until January 2026, to decided how many of the 36 teams in contention move to the knock-out stages.
Among them, there are seven teams that have previously won the European Cup (Aston Villa, Oporto, Celtic, Feyenoord, Red Star Belgrade (Crvena zvezda), FCSB, and Nottingham Forest) and some old legends like Malmo, Ferencvaros, and Dinamo Zagreb. However, according to Opta's statistics, there's one big favourites among the rest: Aston Villa.
The reason why this computerized program, based on thousands of simulations made with recent data, gives Aston Villa a 23.3% chance of winning Europa League, and 37% of reaching the final (with the second, Roma, having 13% chances of winning and 23.1% of reaching the final) is clear: they have the largest squad value according to Transfermarket, 547 million euros, and their coach, Unai Emery, has already won the competition four times (with Sevilla in 2014, 2015, and 2016, and with Villarreal in 2021).
Aston Villa debut against Bologna on Thursday, coming from an awful streak at Premier League, still with no victories (two defeats and three draws). The other Premier League team, Nottingham Forest, are given the third best chance.
Top 10 teams with better chances to win Europa League (according to Opta)
Aston Villa - 23.3%
Roma - 13%
Nottingham Forest - 10.2%
Lille - 8.1%
Olympique Lyonnais - 6.7%
Bologna - 5.7%
Porto - 5.3%
Feyenoord - 5.1%
Stuttgart - 3.2%
Real Betis - 3.1%
Here's the full schedule of games for the League Phase of Europa League. Who do you think will win?