As club football officially kicked off on Wednesday, Augusr 14, 2024, with the UEFA Super Cup fixture, Atalanta vs Real Madrid, other top competitions have also officially received kick off dates as well.
Arguably the biggest European club football, the UEFA Champions League returns soon for its 2024/2025 season and fans are eager to know what to expect. Here are key details about the upcoming Champions League draw for its 2024/2025 edition.
When is the Champions League draw?
The group stage draw for the 2024/2025 UEFA Champions League will be held at the Grimaldi Forum in Monaco on 29th August 2024.
With the new format, the draw process has changed. Instead of former footballers manually selecting balls from pots to form groups, automated software will now randomly assign eight opponents to each team from four pots and determine which matches will be played at home and away.
What is the new Champions League format?
This year’s Champions League will adopt a new format. Instead of 32 teams split into eight groups of four, 36 teams will form a single league. Each team will play eight matches (four at home and four away) against different opponents, known as the ‘Swiss Model’.
After this phase, the top eight teams will advance to the last 16. Teams ranked ninth to 24th will compete in a play-off round, while those finishing 25th or lower will be eliminated. The 36 clubs will be divided into four pots based on their club coefficients, playing against two teams from each pot.
Country protection rules will apply to avoid teams from the same country playing each other, except to prevent deadlocks.
The change aims to ensure a bright future for European football, involve more teams, offer more top matches earlier in the competition, and create a balanced competition by pairing teams of similar skill levels.
Pots ahead of the 2024/2025 Champions League draw
- Pot 1: Real Madrid, Manchester City, Bayern Munich, Paris Saint-Germain, Liverpool, Inter Milan, Borussia Dortmund, RB Leipzig, Barcelona
- Pot 2: Bayer Leverkusen, Atlético Madrid, Atalanta, Juventus, Benfica, Arsenal, Club Brugge, Shakhtar Donetsk, Milan
- Pot 3: Feyenoord, Sporting CP, PSV Eindhoven, Celtic
- Pot 4: Monaco, Aston Villa, Bologna, Girona, VfB Stuttgart, Sturm Graz, Brest
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