Legia Warsaw is easy Trabzonspor is a nightmare journey Metallica Kharkiv will be played in another country most likely
It seems that UEFA are changing the seedings from next season. http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/fo...rs-seeds-Champions-League-seeding-revamp.html
That's just going to create "group of deaths" because the champions of lets say Sweden are hardly on par with Chelsea for example. It'll knock more bigger teams out in the group stage and let the champions of Denmark reach the semi final by beating teams from Turkey, Greece and Norway along the way (all hypothetical countries) whilst lets say PSG are knocked out having been in the same group as Juventus, Barcelona and Bayern Munich (which could happen if some of those didn't win their respective leagues). And how will they decide if pot 2? How do they classify which league to cut off from with the champions seedings and start moving on to runners up and third places? It's not an ideal move in my book.
tbf, without being seen as a a twat, we did have a rather ridiculously favourable draw to the final of the fa cup.. must be one of the easiest on record, not trying to slate any achievements btw..
You say that, but I'd ****ing love to see Copenhagen get that far, proper fairytale stuff. The closest thing I've ever considered to a second team is Ajax, under the new seedings they might actually get out of the group stage now.
I can't deny we did have an easy run but comparing that competition which is directly knock out to the CL which has a group stage first and is the part they're changing in terms of seedings isnt exactly on par. Plus the FA cup doesn't have any seedings other than determining the stage a team enters.
But would it be as fairy take as you're saying? They're not exactly knocking out big sides (Bradford in the league cup two seasons back for example), they'd just avoid them completely before being crushed in the semi final over two legs by Real Madrid. As a neural, I don't think that'd be as entertaining.
but then again it brings it back to us, the biggest side we knocked out was sunderland enroute to the final.. i know it's a different competition but essentially it's the same.. you can only beat whoever you face on the field.. really.. you can either draw every single team that qualifies for the CL in a random draw, then you could face your own countries participants, or the other big teams.. or it could be pot based.. it's a difficult decision as.. if you look at the last 10 champions league finalists.. there has been a big distinction in it.. i believe it's fine the way it is really..
You would still get big teams spread across the the UCL though, as they are still going to have the 1 nation per group rule.
The thing is, it is called the CHAMPIONS League. It's only right that the CHAMPIONS of the leagues get the highest seedings.
i agree in that essence, even though i hate man city, surely they should have a better draw than bloody arsenal?
Not quite. If group A was lets say Bayern, Man City, Inter Milan and Barcelona. Group B ended up Chelsea, Real Madrid, PSG and Juventus. Group C Athletico Madrid, AC Milan, Liverpool and Ajax (I'm just using names, I'm aware some of these have recently declined/not qualified). By the time the group stage finished, you'd have lost 6 previously "big" sides. Then another three of those are runner up and could face winers from a nearby "big team" group. By the time you've hit the quarter final stage, 9 are now eliminated even with country protection. Meanwhile over in Group F, Galatasaray and Group H's Sporting Lisbon are sitting nicely in a semi final having faced much lesser sides who won their domestic league over in Sweden back in the group. Are TV companies (and their viewers) going to be happy with a one sided Bayern Munich Vs Copenhagen final? It goes back to putting all the champions in pot 1. Are they saying winning the league in Portugal is on par with winning in Germany? By putting them in the same pot they are. I just think, if it ain't broke, don't fix it. The whole media fuss here is over Arsenal being in pot 1.
Are all leagues on par? Therefore are all Champions the best sides to have qualified? That's the whole point in seeding them in the first place.
But it would be spread, as the draw is set out in a way so that teams from the same nation play on different nights - so if you get an English team in Group A for example, usually, they wouldn't be placed into Group B or D. That is all because of TV, unsurprisingly.
Not all Champions would be in Pot 1, obviously. Pot 1 would have the defending champions and the winners of the 7 teams with the highest nation coefficient. Pot 2 would have a mixture of the winners of the second highest coefficient nation leagues, and highest nation second placers. And so on. The 'big' teams would still get around.
