Gloating Plzen care little for Celtic coefficient misery as 4 teams hunt down Rangers guarantee

Viktoria Plzen boss Miroslav Koubek has lapped up Celtic's Champions League nightmare after the Czech side denied next season's Scottish Premiership winners an automatic spot in the 2025/26 group stage.

The Czech Republic have overtaken Scotland in the rankings after thanks to Plzen's 0-0 draw with Fiorentina in the first leg of the Europa Conference League quarter-final clash. The Czech outfit knew beforehand that a draw in either leg was enough to see their nation leapfrog the Scots in the standings and they have now nabbed the spot and taken 10th place in the UEFA rankings.

Koubek was spotted by reporters throwing his arms up in the air in celebration after the goalless draw - which sparked questions over why he was celebrating the stalemate with the second leg still to come. He said: "We didn't win anything. It's 0-0 and we're going to Florence. We didn't win anything and we didn't advance.

"I was happy for the team that they managed it and at that moment I was thinking about the Czech coefficient. That was the joy."

For Rangers, there is still hope that they can secure an automatic spot in Europe's elite competition thanks to their personal club coefficient. Their individual club coefficient ranking means they would secure a spot thanks to the new Champions League format that comes into effect next season, if the club can become the highest ranked champion in qualifying.

The Champions League winner qualifies automatically through their domestic league and their entry becomes spare and goes to the top ranked champions in the qualifiers. As detailed by Scotland's coefficient, this would be Rangers but it will be the coefficient standings at the end of next season that count.

This means that the Light Blues can