Champions League Groups (Update p6)

[sam663]

Manchester City highly likely to drop into third pot of seeds for the Champions League next season. Could draw Bayern and Juventus. Man City will move up from 28th to 22nd in UEFA coefficient ranking but higher teams qualifying for UCL means they will drop a pot , via <a class="postlink" href="https://twitter.com/dalejohnsonESPN" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;">https://twitter.com/dalejohnsonESPN</a> .

 

[City Raider]

does this change on a weekly basis or is there no update on latest position?

 

[JGL07]

I also looked at cut-off points in recent years to get into different pots:

Pot 1:
2009/10 - 92
2010/11 - 95
2011/12 - 95
2012/13 - 90
2013/14 - 100 ? (approx.)

Pot 2:
2009/10 - 53
2010/11 - 57
2011/12 - 61
2012/13 - 62
2013/14 - 71 ? (approx.)

Apart from this season for Pot 1, the trend is clear (especially to get into Pot 2) - the number of co-efficient points you need to get into the top 2 pots has increased over recent years.

The main reason for this has been the consistency of sides like Porto / Benfica / Shaktar / Zenit / Olympiacos in qualifying for CL alongside usual suspects such as Utd / Barca / Bayern etc.

The 5 year calculation system massively favours consistency in picking up points over one-off successes.

Assuming current trends continue, it is very difficult to see points thresholds coming down much over next few years (even if names change e.g. PSG replacing Lyon)

In 2014/15 season (assuming City qualify) we lose our 20 points from "Hamburg" campaign...so we need to get out of group stages next season (worth around 20 points) just to stand still.

In 2015/16 season it is better news as a low-point season drops off...and we will have 47 points + whatever we pick up from next 2 campaigns.

If we want to be knocking on the door of Pot 1, points needed will likely be in 95-100 range for reasons outlined above.
Getting out of group = 21 points (approx)
Q-Final = 25 points
S-Final = 28 points

Bottom Line: if we want to break out of cycle of always getting difficult groups because of our seeding...we need to get to Q-Final stage (at least) in each of next two seasons.*

* or take Europa league very seriously if we finish 3rd in group
e.g. Chelsea picking up 25 points this season (+ still counting) vs 21 for Utd who got out of group stages but lost to Real Madrid.

The system favours teams from less competitive leagues such as Portugal and Spain where Barcelona , Real Madrid, Porto and Benfica are going to qualify every year and Valencia and Sporting will qualify most years. More competitive leagues such as France, Germany and Italy are less well served. Bayern are the only guaranteed qualifier from Germany while no-one is assured in France (maybe PSG from now on) or Italy (maybe AC Milan given Juventus's recent 'problems').

England used to be the least competitive league in that United, Arsenal, Chelsea and Liverpool would all qualify every year. Now City have bust that cartel along with Spurs.

I don't expect City to make much progress next year as they are defending 20 points but they should certainly push up to the middle of Pot 2 for the 2015-16 Champions' League. If they could win the thing (or at least a Europa League) they may be in a position to go for Pot 1 the year after that.

 

[Daz_Blue]

Utd's group


Man Utd
Team from Poland nobody has heard of
Team from Russia nobody has heard of
Team from Bulgaria nobody has heard of

 

[Syth]

Utd's group


Man Utd
Team from Poland nobody has heard of
Team from Russia nobody has heard of
Team from Bulgaria nobody has heard of

Don't be ridiculous! I know the teams from my country and none of them will even make the third qualifying round lol. But I see where you are going with this and agree with you!

 

[kawkav]

does this change on a weekly basis or is there no update on latest position?

if you mean uefa coefficient, there is always up date until the uefa league and ucl are over. as for this year the only teams still active and therefor gaining points are four finalist of these two competitions.

edit: actually because of chelsea we could still improve our ranking. as if they win uefa cup englands uefa coefficient goes up and that will change our co-ef.
we actually might pass Zenit and make a place good or even two and pass juve.

 

[Anonymous]

The boy has gone for:

Barca
PSG
City
Napoli

Although he wants:

Porto
Lyon
City
Celtic

 

[MCRJON]

So im bored at work, i could either:

a) join in on one of the anti City, anti Board, anti Pelligrnini, what does hollistic mean threads
b) work out the entire champions league draw using already qualified teams, current league positions and co-efficients as deciders.

Working on the basis that UEFA seeds every draw, and working on the assumption that every top seed gets through - which is quite an assumption. We get the below pots, in brackets is the round that the team entered qualifying

Pot 1
Bayern Munich
Barcelona
Chelsea
Real Madrid
Man United
Arsenal (Play-Off Non Champs)
Porto
Benfica

Pot 2
Athletico Madrid
Lyon (Third Qual Non-Champs)
Shaktar Donetsk
AC Milan (Play-Off Non Champs)
Shalke 04 (Play-Off Non Champs)
Marseille
CSKA Moscow
PSG

Pot 3
Juventus
Zenith St Petersburg (Third Qual Non-Champs)
Man City
Ajax
Borussia Dortmund
FC Basel (Third Qual Champs)
Olympiakos
Galatasaray

Pot 4
Bayer Leverkusen
FC Kobenhavn
Napoli
Anderlecht
BATE Borisov (2nd Qual)
Celtic (2nd Qual)
Steaua Bucharest (2nd Qual)
APOEL Nicosia (Third Qual Champs)

Best case for City
Benfica, Marseille, City, APOEL

Worst Case
Munich, Athletico / PSG, City, Napoli

either way, not too bad.

 

[Nevizade]

Benfica, Atletico and Anderlecht would be perfect for me. Shouldn't be too difficult (depending on who replaces Falcao at AdM) and 3 cracking places for a piss-up!

 

[decmancity]

It doesn't really matter who is in our group or what pot we are in. Chelsea were pot one last year and got Juventus and Shakhtar!

We have a squad of players good enough to get out of any of them. We perhaps were just always lacking the right manager?