Unique Situation where a team would lose on purpose?

[Metz]

Suppose this is the Premier League Table:

TEAM GD POINTS
--------------------------------------
Team 1 +38 80
Team 2 +32 78
Team 3 +26 72
Team 4 +10 68
Team 5 +9 65
Team 6 +8 65
Team 7 +8 64
Team 8 +7 62
Team 9 +6 58


Team 8 is in the FA cup final against team 9 and team 8 wins the FA cup final.

Team 8 also has to play team 9 in the last game of the league.

If team 9 wins the league match then team 8 will still qualify for the Europa League even though they will finish 8th place.

If team 8 wins and has a big goal difference, they willl-leap frog all the way up to position 5, qualifying directly for the Europa league. This would mean that team 9 would directly qualify for Europa league since team 8 qualified via winning the FA cup final.

So now, it would be better for team 9 in the long run to let team 8 win in the league match by at least 3 goals that way they would have continental qualification for being the runner-ups in the FA cup to a team that already qualified via league position.


Has this ever happened?

 

[Joss]

Hmm. If the FA suspected anything, I imagine there'd be serious consequences. And unless the team just goes and plays **** (or someone does this), it would probably be fairly obvious. I suppose they could just field a weaker team knowing they've got nothing to play for (and get fined by the FA like Holloway?) but I shouldn't think they'd try it.

 

[Aannddyy]

No, team 6 would qualify. The runner up only enters the Europa League if the winner is in the Champions League, which they aren't so the place would go to team 6.

 

[Puddz]

Unlikely scenario so probably never happened. You haven't taken into account teams 5, 6 and 7. They all need to draw/lose for team 8 to get to 5th. So unless you manager to convince them to lose, which would be match fixing, I doubt this would ever happen.

I know there was a game where a team scored an own goal to get the game to go to penalties. Only real example I know of where a team deliberately tried to force an outcome of a game.

 

[Eighteen89]

Something similar almost happened last year when Stoke played Man City at the end of the season. Stoke would only get into Europe through the FA Cup if Man City qualified for the Champions League, so a City win would boost their chances of Champions League football therefore letting Stoke play in the Europa League.

I don't think Stoke lost on purpose but they ended up getting beat 3-0.