Europa League Winners – The Complete List Since Inception

Who are the Europa League winners? How many of them have there been since the inception of the competition? I will list all the Europa League winners here in a bit.

The UEFA Europa League is considered the second most important international competition for European club – that is of course after the UEFA Champions League.

Qualification for the Europa League is based on clubs’ performance in national leagues and cup competitions.

For the first 25 years of the League’s existence, the final was contested over two legs; one at each participating club's stadium.

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But in 1998, UEFA introduced the first single-legged final where Internazionale defeated Lazio to become the first Europa League winners in that instance and it was held at a neutral venue, the Parc des Princes in Paris.

The inaugural competition was won by Tottenham Hotspur in 1972 when they defeated Wolverhampton Wanderers 3–2 on aggregate.

So far, we have seen a total of nine finals feature teams from the same national association and they are Italy (1990, 1991, 1995, and 1998), Spain (2007 and 2012), England (1972), Germany (1980) and Portugal (2011).

Sevilla are the team with the most victories. They’ve won the competition five times since commencement.

The only two teams to have retained their title are Real Madrid, who are winners in 1985 and 1986, and Sevilla who are winners in 2006 and 2007; and in 2014, 2015, and 2016.

Spain remains the only country that has won the competition the most, winning it 11 times.

Shakhtar Donetsk were the last champions before the UEFA Cup was renamed UEFA Europa League. They defeated Werder Bremen 2–1 after extra time in the 2009 final.

Both Benfica and Marseille are the two clubs with the highest record of loss in the finals, with three losses in the competition.

The current UEFA Europa League winner are Villarreal CF, edging past Manchester United 11-10 on penalties after scores stood at 1-1 in 2021's Europa League Final in Gdansk.