What Europa League top spot is worth to Arsenal amid battle with PSV Eindhoven

Arsenal are back in Europa League action on Thursday night when they take on FC Zurich.

The Gunners suffered a setback last week when they lost 2-0 to PSV Eindhoven, missing the chance to wrap up top spot in their group with a game to spare. Arsenal now face a battle to secure top spot, and there is a significant difference between finishing top or second in the Europa League group stage.

If PSV win against Bodo/Glimt, then Arsenal will need to beat Zurich. A draw will not be enough due to PSV taking the lead in head-to-head with the 2-0 win last week. Though, with Arsenal holding a two-point advantage, PSV will need to win their last game.

The main advantage to finishing top in a Europa League group - at least since the competition was reshaped in recent years - is that group winners get to play two less games. After the group stage, there is a knockout playoff round, and that sees Europa League group runners-up take on the teams dropping out of the Champions League by way of finishing third in their groups.

The winners of those play-off games then progress to the Round of 16 to play one of the Europa League group winners, who re-enter the competition.

As ever, there is also a financial aspect to all this. Should Arsenal win their group, they will receive a prize of £951,819 plus a further prize of £1.03million for reaching the Round of 16, totalling just over £1.98million.

By contrast, finishing as a runner-up nets a prize of £475,832 with a further prize of £432,575 for reaching the Round of 32, and there is another prize worth £1.03million should that group runner-up reach the Round of 16. So, in short, runners-up are guaranteed prize money of £908,407, which is £1.07million less than what is received by the group winners, but the runners-up can earn £2.1million overall on their way to the Round of 16, should they reach that stage.

Crucially, though, only three of the eight group runners-up managed to beat their opponents in the play-off round last season, with five of the eight teams dropping out of the Champions League coming out on top.