UEFA Champions League: How does the new format work?

From Manchester United’s last-second heroics in the 1999 final to that night in Istanbul—Liverpool vs. AC Milan in 2005—the Champions League has produced some of soccer’s greatest highlights.

Whether in Africa, America, Asia, or Europe, every professional player dreams of playing in the Champions League, of lining up against the best in the world as the official anthem reverberates across the stadium.

Zinedine Zidane, Ronaldinho, Lionel Messi, and Cristiano Ronaldo, the league’s top goal scorer, have all tasted UEFA glory, which many consider the pinnacle of club soccer.

Times are changing

Following FIFA’s altering of the World Cup format, extending it from a 32-team tournament to 48, it seemed inevitable that UEFA would want to put its own modern spin on the Champions League, and that it has.

With the introduction of VAR and goal-line technology, the world of soccer has transformed exponentially in the last decade. Gone are the days when offside goals stood, and the referee had nothing but his whistle and two linesmen to make split-second decisions.

Now, to many fans’ dismay, referees have more support than a lead vocalist, which has the ability to halt games and ruin a team’s momentum.  

Here’s how the Champions League format works

Rather than mirroring FIFA’s approach by extending the number of groups, UEFA has decided on a more avant-garde approach: scrap the groups and make one league.

They’ve also extended the number of teams from 32 to 36.

Rather than playing three times home and away, teams will play eight different teams (four home, four away).

Like any knockout league, the fixtures are randomized, with numbers chosen out of a pot to decide who plays who and where. To ensure lower-level clubs play the best of the best, there will be four seeding pots, with the highest-ranking teams belonging to the first pot and the lowest in the last pot—each team will play two opponents from each pot.

Once each team has played its allotted games, the top eight sides automatically qualify for the knockout stages.

Teams positioned ninth to 24th will compete in a two-legged match to join the elite eight in the last 16. The rest are eliminated.

An excited UEFA President

The Slovenian native UEFA president, President Aleksander Čeferin, is delighted about the new changes, saying, “UEFA has clearly shown that we are fully committed to respecting the fundamental values of sport and to defending the key principle of open competitions, with qualification based on sporting merit, fully in line with the values and solidarity-based European sports model,

“I am really pleased that it was a unanimous decision of the UEFA Executive Committee, with the European Club Association, European Leagues and national associations all agreeing with the proposal made. Another proof that European football is more united than ever.”

Are you watching the Champions League?

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