Who awaits Hearts, Hibs and Motherwell in Euro draws?
The World Cup has barely started and three of Scotland's five representatives are already having to set their sights on next season's early rounds of European qualifying.Hearts, Hibernian and Motherwell are all involved in Wednesday's draws for the Champions League and Conference League.Rangers do not enter until the third round of Europa League qualifying but will be keeping an eye on their potential opponents too.So who could the other three face when the draw for the Champions League is made at 11:00 BST and the Conference League two hours later in Nyon?Would Hearts' McInnes be 'perfect fit' for Rangers?Just's rise from Austrian second tier to World Cup breakout starHearts face Fenerbahce or Sturm GrazAs Scottish Premiership runners-up, Hearts will be playing in the Champions League qualifiers for the first time in 20 years.Back then, they defeated Bosnia-Herzegovina's Siroki Brijeg in the second qualifying round before losing to AEK Athens and dropping into the Uefa Cup.Hearts will enter at the same stage again and already know they will be facing one of two seeded opponents - either Fenerbahce of Turkey or Sturm Graz of Austria - in the League Path of the draw reserved for domestic runners-up.The first leg of those ties will on 21/22 July, with the reverse fixtures the following midweek.By that time they will likely be under new management, with head coach Derek McInnes seemingly poised to switch to Rangers.Should they be drawn against Fenerbahce and win, Hearts will be seeded in the third qualifying round and will face either Czech Republic's Sparta Prague, NEC Nijmegen of the Netherlands, the winner between Sturm Graz and Poland's Gornik Zabrze - or Union Saint-Gilloise of Belgium.The latter scenario would pit two of the other clubs in which Brighton & Hove Albion owner Tony Bloom has invested against one another.However, while all three clubs use Bloom's Jamestown Analytics firm for recruitment, the gambling tycoon has kept his investment in both Hearts and Union below 30% to make sure they comply with Uefa's multi-club ownership rules.Should Hearts be drawn against Sturm Graz and win, they will be unseeded and face either Lyon, Bodo/Glimt, Olympiacos or the winner of Fenerbahce against Gornik.Lose at the first hurdle and the Edinburgh side will drop into the Europa League third qualifying round.There, they would be unseeded in the same part of the draw as Rangers, who will be seeded for their first European fixture of the season.However, there are a lot of ifs and buts before that draw on 20 July.Hibs & Motherwell face greater uncertaintyTalking of ifs and buts, the Conference League's second qualifying round draw is full of them, although it became slightly clearer on Wednesday morning, when Uefa simplified the draw by placing the 86 clubs in nine groups.Despite finishing fifth behind Motherwell in the Premiership last season, Hibs find themselves seeded while the Fir Park side are not.It means Motherwell's potential opponents on 23 and 30 July have now been narrowed down to Denmark's FC Copenhagen, Finland's HJK Helsinki, Zrinjski Mostar of Bosnia-Herzegovina, Havnar Boltfelag of the Faroe Islands, or the winner of the first qualifying round tie between Wales' Caernarfon Town and Levadia Tallinn of Estonia.Meanwhile, Hibs could be drawn against Croatia's Varazdin or the winners of ties between Vllaznia of Albania and Malisheva of Kosovo, Penybont of Wales against Santa Coloma of Andorra, Mondorf-les-Bains of Luxembourg against Dinamo Tbilisi of Georgia, and Qarabag of Azerbaijan against Vestri of Iceland.Well go into the draw still considering who to appoint as manager after Jens Berthal Askou was poached by Toulouse after a successful season at Fir Park.Whoever succeeds the Dane will be hoping to avoid the ignominy of their last Conference League venture, when they were knocked out at the same stage by Republic of Ireland's Sligo Rovers four years ago.Hibs head coach David Gray will, meanwhile, hope he can take his side one step further than last season, when they lost narrowly to Midtjylland in Europa League qualifying, beat Partizan in Conference League qualifying but then were defeated by Legia Warsaw in the play-off round.