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| Possible teams Barça could face in the UCL group stage |
FC Barcelona will know their 2016/2017 UEFA Champions League group stage opponents today in the CL draw set to take place in Monaco.
Despite surprisingly crashing out in the quarter finals after a defeat to Atletico Madrid, Barça are still one of the big favourites to scoop Europe’s most prestige club football honour. The Catalan giants are seeded in Pot 1 for the Champions League group stage draw as they were champions of their national league.
All teams in other pots will be hoping to avoid FC Barcelona in the draw as they won’t be willing to face the menacing presence of Lionel Messi and company but Barça, knowing their capabilities, will be ready to take on any club they’re given. They’ve not been getting favourable draws recently and last year they were draw with AS Roma and ayern Leverkusen, along with APOEL.
Barça are in pot one alongside the winners of other top European leagues: Leicester City (England), Juventus (Italy), Bayern Munich (Germany), PSG (France), CSKA Moscow (Russia) and Benfica (Portugal). These seven teams are joined by Real Madrid, the current defending champions of the CL trophy.
Teams in the second pot will hope to get Benfica from pot one and also Leicester City who will be featuring in their first ever Champions League tournament. Seeded in pot 2 are Sevilla – the 2015/2016 Europa League winners, Atletico Madrid, Arsenal, Manchester City, Borussia Dortmund, Porto, Leverkusen and Napoli.
The third pot features teams with less coefficient points while pot four are filled with teams who made the group stage through the CL playoff round.
CHAMPIONS LEAGUE DRAW 2016/2017 SEEDED POTS
POT 1: Real Madrid (holders), FC Barcelona, Bayern Munich, Leicester City, Juventus, Benfica, PSG, CSKA Moscow;
POT 2: Atletico Madrid, Borussia Dortmund, Arsenal, Manchester City, Sevilla, Porto, Napoli, Bayer Leverkusen;
POT 3: FC Basel, Tottenham Hotspurs, Dynamo Kiev, Lyon, PSV Eindhoven, Sporting CP, Club Brugge, Borussia Monchengladbach;
POT 3: Celtic, AS Monaco, Besiktas, Legia Warsaw, Dinamo Zagreb, Ludogorets Razgrad, FC Copenhagen, Rostov.
POSSIBLE BARCELONA OPPONENTS
As it should be, the group will feature four teams, one from each pot which means a team can’t face another team from its pot (Barça can’t face Leicester). Also, a team can’t face another team from the same country/association irrespective of their pot, this means Barça can’t face Atletico Madrid, Sevilla and Real Madrid because they all are from Spain. Teams from Ukraine and Russia also can’t face each other in the group stages.
Barça will therefore face one
of Arsenal, Manchester City, Dortmund, Porto, Napoli and Leverkusen from Pot 1; One team among the eight in Pot 2 and one team among the eight in pot three.
In my opinion, the worst case scenario (toughest draw) Barça could get would be Dortmund, Tottenham and AS Monaco. The easiest we can draw will be Bayer Leverkusen, Club Brugge and Rostov. The draw will be made at 6:00pm CET and will also see the presentation of the UEFA Best Player in Europe award for 2015/2016. Group stage games start in September.