Major clubs to have never won the Champions League or the Europa League

Davor Suker of Arsenal after missing a penalty against Galatasaray

The success of a football club is measured in the number of national titles that it has won, but for a club to be truly considered among the elite, it has to win the Continental crown. The aura that Real Madrid has would never have been there had it not won those European Cups five years in a row since the competition’s inception.

Similarly, Barcelona trouncing one English club after another over the previous European seasons gave it the credibility for being considered the best club in the world.

But there have been some major clubs in Europe who have never been lucky when it came to winning a European title. Even a victory in the second-tier Europa League is considered to be a reflection of the club’s European pedigree, as observed from the hoopla surrounding Liverpool’s victory over Borussia Dortmund in the Europa League quarter-finals. 

This list takes a look at seven major European clubs never to have won a European title - be it the Champions League or the Europa League.

P.S: Defunct competitions like the Cup Winners Cup and the Inter-Cities Fairs Cup are not taken into consideration

1) Arsenal

Arsenal were beaten by Barcelona in the 2006 Champions League final

Arsene Wenger and co can crow about Arsenal being a European giant any number of times, but the fact remains that despite its stellar record of qualifying for the Champions League, Arsenal have never gone on to win the competition. In fact, they have never even won the second-tier UEFA Cup/Europa League either.

To their credit, they have won an Inter-Cities Fairs cup and a UEFA Cup Winners Cup, but the big two have always eluded the London side. They have made an appearance in the final of both competitions, though.

Barcelona rallied to beat Thierry Henry’s Gunners 2-1 at the Stade de France in the final of the 2005-06 UEFA Champions League and Arsenal haven’t been close since. The London side also reached a UEFA Cup final in 1999-00 against an unfancied Galatasaray side but were narrowly beaten in a penalty shootout with both Patrick Vieira and Davor Suker missing from the spot.

Consider the fact that newly relegated Aston Villa have won a European Cup and you can put Arsenal’s plight into perspective.