EXPLAINER
Which teams are playing and what’s the league’s format? What are the new rules? Al Jazeera breaks it down.
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.
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.
🆕 League phase line-up!#UCLdraw | #UCL pic.twitter.com/yFs5uipkfQ
— UEFA Champions League (@ChampionsLeague) August 28, 2024
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.
✨ UEFA Champions League all-time top scorer ✨
🏆 Record #UCL golden boot in seven different seasons
🏆 Record 17 goals in a single campaign
🏆 Record 140 goals in 183 games
@Cristiano will receive a special award from UEFA president Aleksander Čeferin this week in Monaco!— UEFA (@UEFA) August 27, 2024
How will the draw work?
Rather than a manual draw, UEFA will now operate a hybrid draw.
Each of the 36 teams will still be manually drawn out, working down through the four seeding pots from top to bottom, but instead of drawing their opponents manually, this will now be done digitally and take little more than a second per team.
Once the team is drawn manually, the software will pick the opponents and where the teams will play – home or away.
How will teams qualify for the knockout stage?
The 36 clubs will be ranked together in the one league with the top eight all progressing to the last 16 and the format of the competition from that point on remaining the same.
However, it will be seeded, taking into account positions in the league phase.
In addition, a playoff round will be introduced with the teams finishing from ninth to 24th in the league phase going through to a two-legged knockout tie to decide the remaining spots in the last 16. These playoff ties will be seeded.
CONFIRMED: #UCLdraw pots for the league phase ✅ pic.twitter.com/hlVrDh7Hvt
— UEFA Champions League (@ChampionsLeague) August 28, 2024
What are the dates of the Champions League group stage?
- Matchday 1: 17, 18, 19 September 2024
- Matchday 2: 1, 2 October 2024
- Matchday 3: 22, 23 October 2024
- Matchday 4: 5, 6 November 2024
- Matchday 5: 26, 27 November 2024
- Matchday 6: 10, 11 December 2024
- Matchday 7: 21, 22 January 2025
- Matchday 8: 29 January 2025
Will bottom teams still qualify for the Europa League?
No. The bottom 12 teams in the league phase will be simply eliminated.
What else is new?
Each of the three UEFA men’s club competitions will now have one “exclusive week” when there will be no matches played in the other two competitions that week.
For the Champions League, the exclusive week is matchday one with games to be played on September 17, 18 and 19. The Europa League’s is also its first match round on September 25 and 26 while the Conference League’s exclusive week is its last round of league phase games on December 19.
Will the prize money remain the same?
There is more money to be distributed among the clubs involved in the league phase of the Champions League – $2.6bn this season compared with $2.2bn in 2023-24 – although the new figure will be shared among 36 clubs rather than the previous 32.