New Delhi: With the maiden Champions League edition featuring a league phase headed towards a thrilling final gameweek 25 teams of the 36 teams are still unsure about their fate in the competition. Matchday eight will see all 18 games played at the same time frame with 16 games having a lot at stake.
Manchester City are facing possible elimination after their collapse against Paris Saint-Germain, which saw them lose 4-2. For City to qualify they need to beat Club Brugge. Liverpool and Barcelona are through to the round of 16 while Arsenal are closing in on a final-eight finish. The Gunners just need a win against Girona to confirm their spot.
Aston Villa are just outside the final eight and will hope to take a win against Celtic to give themselves a chance at direct final 16 qualification. Of course, along with this they need the five teams sitting above them to make a slip and cannot afford teams below them to take a win with a big goal margin.
How teams can qualify for the knockout phase
The new edition of the Champions League will see the top eight teams qualify for the final 16 while the teams between the ninth and 24th will play a two-legged knockout phase playoff with the last 12 teams getting eliminated from the competition. This has kept the competition exciting, unlike the earlier version where teams were divided into groups of four with the top two teams going through to the knockout stage.
The teams between ninth and 16th will be seeded and face a team placed between 17th and 24th and will get the advantage of playing the second leg at home. Unlike previous editions, this time the eliminated teams won’t be relegated to a lower European competition like the Europa League. The play-off ties will take place in mid-February while the round of 16 games will be played in the first two weeks of March.
How do teams’ qualifications look?
Confirmed Top-eight teams
Liverpool, Barcelona
Confirmed Top-24 team
Arsenal, Inter Milan, Atletico Madrid, AC Milan, Atalanta, Bayer Leverkusen, Aston Villa, Monaco, Feyenoord, Lille, Brest, Borussia Dortmund, Bayern Munich, Real Madrid, Juventus, Celtic
Teams uncertain of playoff advancement
PSV, Club Brugge, Benfica, PSG, Sporting, Stuttgart, Manchester City, Dinamo Zagreb, Shakhtar Donetsk
Teams confirmed of elimination
Bologna, Sparta Prague, Leipzig, Girona, Red Star Belgrade, Sturm Graz, Salzburg, Slovan Bratislava, Young Boys
How the teams from ninth to 24th play their playoff?
A lot of the fixtures for the teams going to the playoffs depend on where they finish in the league table and when they will face teams in the knockout stage. Since the Reds are confirmed for a top-two finish, means in the final 16 they will play a team who have finished 15th, 16th, 17 or 18th.
The opponent will only be known once after the playoffs though a pre-determined draw means that the team winning the ties in these four places will be the ones the Reds will play. A team that finishes seventh or eighth though could be playing a team that has finished ninth or tenth.
The teams between ninth to 16th play a seeded knockout phase play-off fixture. Which means they will play a team that finishes between 17th and 24th. Who the seeded teams will play is going to be determined by draw but clubs only have two possible teams. For instance team that finishes 11th or 12th will paired together and play a team that finishes 21st or 22nd.
Another group will pair teams that finish ninth and 10th in the table playing the side that finished 23rd or 24th. The two pairs of games will be drawn into opposition half of the complete draw, with the seeded teams getting to play their second leg at home, profiting from finishing higher in the league phase.
Is the format successful?
One matchday to go! 😲#UCL pic.twitter.com/jEYfEM9kTC
— UEFA Champions League (@ChampionsLeague) January 22, 2025
One of the main reasons for UEFA bringing the change in the format was to have every game relevant. They had said that the format would ensure that any combination of results could change a team’s place in the table until the very last matchday as well. On the final day, Strum Graz playing RB Leipzig and Young Boys playing Red Star Belgrade as the only two fixtures whose results have little effect.
In the other 16 games, there are fixtures in which both teams are playing for the same result. These include Manchester City playing Club Brugge, Stuttgart hosting PSG, Brest taking on Real Madrid and Inter Milan facing Monaco.
Then there is Aston Villa who are going to be affected by other results and either overtake six teams in front of them or be pushed down 15 places, which includes their opponent Celtic.
The other reason was for the big teams to have more games between themselves at the start of the season. This explains Real Madrid facing Borussia and Liverpool, Barcelona clashing with Bayern Munich while PSG has faced Arsenal Atletico Madrid, Bayern Munich and Manchester City.
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