IT has been common knowledge for some time now that Rangers or Celtic look likely to earn an automatic spot in next season's Champions League. 

Currently, whoever goes on to win the Premiership title at the end of the season will enter the group stages of the 2022/23 UEFA competition. 

Not only will it be great for either team to be back in Europe's top tournament, it will land them a whopping £40million. 

However, it is not all set in stone yet. It could all of course change.

That comes down to Scotland's European coefficient ranking. 

Teams earn two points for a win, and one for a draw. 

Finishing this season in the top 10 will guarantee the automatic Champions League place.

The Old Firm registered positive results last night with a draw and a win respectively in the final matchday games of the Europa League groups. 

Rangers earned a draw away in Lyon, while Celtic came out on top in a five-goal thriller versus Real Betis. 

Their fates were already determined prior to these matches though, with Rangers progressing to the Europa League last-32 and Celtic dropping down to the Europa Conference League. 

Rangers will face one of the third-place Champions League teams in the next round. 

Due to results elsewhere yesterday, Scotland has dropped to 10th in the overall coefficient rankings. 

Scotland started the season in 11th place. Should they drop back out of the top ten, it would be likely that the automatic slot would no longer be up for grabs, so it's important that both sides continue to pick up good results in Europe after Christmas.

There are 24 direct qualification places for the Champions League.

Those are the league winners from the top 10 countries by coefficient, the runners-up from the nations ranked from one to six and the third and fourth teams from Europe's top four leagues.

Then, a further two places are reserved for the winners of the Champions League and the Europa League.

Although, if the winners of those competitions have already qualified the automatic place moves down the coefficient list to outside the top ten.

Russia has leapfrogged the Premiership thanks to the bonus point system in place for qualifying. So nothing is guaranteed quite yet.