The 2002–03 UEFA Cup was the 32nd edition of the UEFA Cup, the second-tier European club football tournament organised by UEFA. The final was played between Portuguese side Porto and Scottish side Celtic at the Estadio Olímpico de Sevilla, Seville, on 21 May 2003. Porto won 3–2 after silver goal extra time and became the first Portuguese team to win the competition. Feyenoord could not defend their title as they automatically qualified for the 2002–03 UEFA Champions League and were also eliminated from all European competitions after finishing bottom of their group.

Association team allocation

A total of 145 teams from 51 UEFA member associations participated in the 2002–03 UEFA Cup. The association ranking based on the UEFA country coefficients was used to determine the number of participating teams for each association: The winners of the 2001–02 UEFA Cup were given an additional entry as title holders if they did not qualify for the 2002–03 UEFA Champions League or UEFA Cup through their domestic performance. However, this additional entry was not necessary for this season since the title holders (Feyenoord) qualified for European competitions through their domestic performance.

Association ranking

For the 2002–03 UEFA Cup, the associations were allocated places according to their 2001 UEFA country coefficients, which took into account their performance in European competitions from 1996–97 to 2000–01. Apart from the allocation based on the country coefficients, associations had additional teams participating in the UEFA Cup, as noted below:

Distribution

Since the title holders (Feyenoord) qualified for the Champions League through their domestic performance, the first round spot reserved for the title holders was vacated, and the following changes to the default allocation system were made:

Redistribution rules

A UEFA Cup place is vacated when a team qualifies for both the Champions League and the UEFA Cup, or qualifies for the UEFA Cup by more than one method. When a place is vacated, it is redistributed within the national association by the following rules:

Teams

The labels in the parentheses show how each team qualified for the place of its starting round:

Round and draw dates

The schedule of the competition was as follows (all draws held at UEFA headquarters in Nyon, Switzerland, unless stated otherwise).

Qualifying round

The draw was held on 21 June 2002 in Geneva, Switzerland.

First round

The draw was held on 30 August 2002 in Monaco.

Second round

The draw was held on 8 October 2002 in Nyon, Switzerland.

Final phase

In the final phase, teams played against each other over two legs on a home-and-away basis, except for the one-match final. The mechanism of the draws for each round was as follows:

Bracket

Third round

The draw was held on 15 November 2002 in Geneva, Switzerland.

Fourth round

The draw for the fourth round was held on 13 December 2002.

Quarter-finals

Semi-finals

Final

Top goalscorers