Europe’s best learn their Champions League fate on Thursday with the group stage draw. Real Madrid, now without Cristiano Ronaldo and Zinedine Zidane, will be aiming for a remarkable fourth triumph on the trot, but find themselves sixth favourites.
Manchester City are the bookies’ tip for triumph, following closely by Juventus, Paris Saint-Germain and Barcelona.
While Chelsea and Arsenal are set for stints in the Europa League, the Premier League are back to four representatives in City, Manchester United, Tottenham and last year’s runners-up Liverpool.
Find out which Pot each team, with their coefficient, is in below…
Pot 1
Real Madrid
Atletico Madrid
Barcelona
Bayern Munich
Manchester City
Juventus
Paris Saint-Germain
Lokomotiv Moscow
Pot 2
Borussia Dortmund (89.000)
Porto (86.000)
Manchester United (82.000)
Shakhtar Donetsk (81.000)
Benfica (80.000)
Napoli (78.000)
Tottenham (67.000)
Roma (64.000)
Pot 3
Liverpool(62.000)
Schalke (62.000)
Lyon (59.500)
Monaco (57.000)
Ajax (53.500)
CSKA Moscow (45.000)
Valencia (36.000)
PSV Eindhoven (36.000)
Pot 4
Viktoria Plzen (33.000)
Club Brugge (29.500)
Galatasaray (29.500)
Young Boys (20.500)
Inter Milan (16.000)
Hoffenheim (14.285)
Red Star Belgrade (10.750)
AEK Athens (10.000)
The group stage draw will take place in Monaco on Thursday 30 August at 5pm .
Since 2009–10 season, the UEFA Champions League begins with a double round-robin group stage of 32 teams, which is preceded by two qualification ‘streams’ for teams that do not receive direct entry to the tournament proper. The two streams are divided between teams qualified by virtue of being league champions, and those qualified by virtue of finishing 2nd–4th in their national championship.
The number of teams that each association enters into the UEFA Champions League is based upon the UEFA coefficients of the member associations. These coefficients are generated by the results of clubs representing each association during the previous five Champions League and UEFA Europa League/UEFA Cup seasons. The higher an association’s coefficient, the more teams represent the association in the Champions League, and the fewer qualification rounds the association’s teams must compete in.
Five of the remaining ten qualifying places are granted to the winners of a four-round qualifying tournament between the remaining 40 or 39 national champions, within which those champions from associations with higher coefficients receive byes to later rounds.
The other five are granted to the winners of a two-round qualifying tournament between the 15 clubs from the associations ranked 1 through 15, which have qualified based upon finishing second, third, or fourth in their respective national league.
In addition to sporting criteria, any club must be licensed by its national association to participate in the Champions League. To obtain a license, the club must meet certain stadium, infrastructure, and finance requirements.