Format, teams, draw: The UEFA Champions League 2024-25 season explained
The main round of the all-new UEFA Champions League season is to get under way in September.
The draw for the bigger and changed-up tournament takes place in Monaco on Thursday, but it won’t be the same as previous years – not entirely anyway.
Here’s how the upcoming season will play out:
How many teams will participate in the Champions League?
The updated version of the Champions League will see 36 clubs feature in the main round of the competition, an increase from 32 under the old format.
How will the four extra teams qualify?
There is an extra place for the fifth-best European league according to UEFA’s ranking, which means France’s Ligue 1 now has three automatic qualifiers.
In addition, there is an extra berth for each of the two leagues with the highest coefficient ranking from last season in UEFA competition, which this year are Germany and Italy.
The remaining extra slot goes to a national champion to emerge from the qualifying rounds.
What’s the format of the new Champions League group stage?
Since 2003, the Champions League featured 32 clubs split into eight groups of four, with the top two from each section advancing to the last 16.
That has now changed radically, and from this season, the 36 clubs will be pooled together in one league in a “Swiss system” more commonly associated with chess.
Earlier, participating teams played six games in the group stage, facing each opponent home and away. Now the clubs will each have eight games, one each against their eight opponents.
How does the new group system work?
The 36 teams will be split into four seeded pots of nine. Every club will play two teams from each pot, one at home and one away.
No team will come up against another club from the same domestic league as them, and every club can only face a maximum of two teams from any one country.
In past years, the group stage ended in December, but the expansion of the Champions League means the two extra matchdays will be staged in January.
How many games will be played in the group stage?
The number of games is increasing from 96 in the old group stage to 144 in the new league phase.
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