Barcelona will be among the first seeds as League winners, and will also be the subject of a special tribute before the draw takes place.
Advertisement
Arsenal will nonetheless be expected to reach the last 16 once again as they and 2013 winners Bayern find themselves in Group F with Olympiakos of Greece and Dinamo Zagreb of Croatia.
Real Madrid, who won “La Decima” two seasons ago are in a group with Paris St Germain, seeing Angel de Maria return to the Bernabeu after his unhappy spell at Manchester United.
City have the toughest draw in the group and could struggle to progress. The stand-out tie in Chelsea’s section sees them paired with Porto, the manager José Mourinho’s former club.
Bayern do have history with Arsenal, having knocked them out of the Champions League in the 2013/14 season.
A team from each of the four pots will be drawn into the eight groups, with no more than one team from any one country in each group.
Barca meanwhile are the holders of the trophy after beating Juventus, while the year before saw an all-Spain final between Real Madrid and Atletico Madrid, as Los Blancos claimed La Decima.
The Draw has officially been released and the Groups for this Year’s UEFA Champions League unveiled.
The Greek Champions were drawn into Group F, alongside Bayern, English Premier League club Arsenal and Croatian champions Dinamo Zagreb.
Manchester United have been drawn in Group B alongside Dutch champions PSV Eindhoven, with Memphis Depay set to return to the club he left this summer. Being placed in Group G, the Blues will have to face Porto (Portugal), Dynamo Kyiv (Ukraine), and M. Tel Aviv (Israel).
Advertisement
This group may not consists of as many glamorous name as City, Juventus, Sevilla, and Gladbach; but along with the group D, this is another group of death. We can watch the other big time matches in other groups such as Barcelona vs. Roma, Manchester City vs. Juventus, and Real Madrid vs. PSG comfortable in the knowledge that we can only face those powerhouse clubs in the knockout stages.
