How the payoff system works

Spine wrote this in a comment. Thought we ought to promote it to here.

Sorry, that should be playoff, of course. Don't know what came over me.

Anyway, the the long and short of it for us is this: It's going to be a real job for Gencler to win a European place this year.

Here's the scam (sorry, plan) the Federation has come up with: At the end of the season the top four teams form the “Super Final Championship Group” (hereafter Top Group) and the second four teams form the “Super Final Europe League Group” (hereafter Second Group).

(I am reminded here of “super secret double probation” from Animal House for some reason.)

The two groups play each other home and away for six weeks of matches. They each begin the payoff league with HALF the points they won in the main league (halves rounded up). I guess this makes it competitive even if one team is streets ahead at the end of the main season. There's a complex set of rules outlined here for what happens if teams end the payoffs on equal points.

Anyway, at the end of this springtime jamboree of champagne football and additional television revenue, European places are allocated as follows:

- First Place in the Top Group goes directly to the Champions League and is declared Champion of that season in Turkey (even if they finished fourth, I guess)

- Second-placed goes to Champions League pre-qualification

- Third joins the winner of the Turkish Cup in the UEFA Europa League, or whatever it's called now.

And....

- Fourth plays the winner of the Second Group for a place in UEFA Europa. This will be a single game and it's set for May 20.

So for the four Second Group teams, there's an awful lot of football to be played for a pretty slim chance of Europe.

Any errors here mine.

Yours, Spine