The draw for the 2015/16 Champions League group stage will take place at 5.45pm UK time on Thursday, the 27th of August, in Monaco. As Barcelona are also Spanish champions, the eighth-ranked Holland receive the vacant seeding place.
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For City who, as relative newcomers to this competition have been dogged by hard draws at this stage in recent years, the prospect remains of a group that might include Barça, Roma and Wolfsburg.
As two clubs from the same country can not be drawn in the same group, all five La Liga clubs will be drawn in separate groups to battle out with other European hopefuls.
Not at this stage, no. Teams from the same association cannot be put in the same group.
What about the other pots?
The knock-on effect of their elevation is the relegation of Real Madrid, Atlético Madrid, Arsenal and Porto to pot two, where they will join Valencia, Manchester City and two from Shakhtar Donetsk, the Europa League winners Sevilla and, if they progress on Wednesday night, Bayer Leverkusen and Manchester United.
Arsenal FC: Arsenal finished third in the Premier League, but are guaranteed to be in Pot 2 irrespective of what happens in the playoffs and will face one domestic champion from a list of FC Barcelona, Bayern Munich, Juventus, Benfica, Paris-Saint Germain, Zenit St Petersburg and PSV from Pot 1.
English giants Manchester United will have their fate decided by then, as they take on Belgian side Club Brugge in the second leg of their play-off tie – up 3-1 form the first leg. Real Madrid, Atletico Madrid, Porto, Arsenal and Manchester City are already guaranteed to be in Pot 2. Barcelona, who beat Juventus in May’s final, will defend the title. Recent years saw two time CL finalists drop in competitiveness as accumulating debt forced them to sell key players (Villa, Mata, Silva, Albiol, Jordi Alba, Mathieu…).
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Having won four European trophies in nine years, Unai Emery’s side deserve enormous credit and respect, and with the likes of Grzegorz Krychowiak, Steven N’Zonzi and Yehven Konoplyanka in their squad, they could be this season’s surprise package. The court of arbitration for sport this week dismissed an appeal by Panathinaikos, last season’s runners-up, to be included instead after Uefa confirmed it had no conclusive evidence from Greece to deny Olympiakos their place.
