Leicester City manager Claudio Ranieri believes his side are the pot-one team their European counterparts will want to face in this season’s Champions League. Spain, Germany, and England now have three teams as automatic qualifiers plus one play-off place.
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The Champions League will continue to have a 32-team group stage and a 16-club knockout phase and the Europa League remains at 48 teams, although in a new development the winners will automatically qualify for the Champions League group stage as now they can potentially take part in a play-off round.
UEFA, which have faced talks of a breakaway Super League, have said only that they were studying possible changes for the 2018-21 cycle.
“Now that the teams have been drawn that excitement is building even more and although it won’t be easy against great champions like Porto, like everyone, I’m curious to see how my players perform”.
The first group games will take place on September 13 and 14, with the final set to take place on June 3 in Cardiff.
Significantly UEFA says “a subsidiary company will be created that will play a strategic role in determining the future and the management of club competitions: UEFA Club Competitions SA, where half of the managing directors will be appointed by UEFA and the other half by the ECA (European Club Association)”.
From 2018, the group stage will include the top four finishers in the previous season’s La Liga, Bundesliga, English Premier League, and Serie A who will have direct entry. They will avoid the risk of losing in the playoff qualifying round and miss tens of millions of euros (dollars) in UEFA prize money.
– The main changes are in the distribution of the 32 places in the group stage and of the revenue.
If there’s one name nobody had ever predicted to be involved with the Champions League draw, it would be Leicester City. Currently, the Europa victor can be made to qualify through the playoffs.
Sevilla has won the Europa League in both years since the incentive was offered, and Spain had five teams in the Champions League groups last season.
Guardiola, who also spent most of his playing career at the Catalan club, steered Barcelona to two Champions League titles as well as a number of other trophies during his time as coach from 2008-12.
Several big clubs, such as Manchester United, Liverpool, Inter Milan and AC Milan, have missed out on this season’s group stage after performing poorly in their respective leagues last season.
UEFA has yet to resolve how the changes will have a knock-on effect on smaller clubs’ access to the Champions League groups.
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A new four-pillar financial distribution system will be introduced based on starting fee, performance in the competition, individual club coefficient and market pool.
