CL 2009/2010

[Blue Wiz]

Anyone noticed the changes in the qualification here? Apparently legaue champions will only face other league champions on their way to the groupstage and non-champions will face non-champions.

Can lead to some very tough qualificationmatches in the last round among the non-champions... and some fairly tough teams dropping down to Europa League. The matches here are simply the topteam playing the worst team (according to their coefficients).

Arsenal-Anderlecht
Olympique Lyon-Celtic
Shakhtar Donetsk-Atletico Madrid
Sporting Lisboa-Fiorentina
Panathinaikos-Stuttgart

 

[SuitsBlueX2]

Bearing in mind your signature, are you absolutely 100% sure as sure can be that that is 100% sure as sure can be correct?
Might there still be a seeding system where countries allowed only one CL spot play against champions from countries allocated two, three or four CL spots.
In essence, might the european powerhouse league champions end up playing versus the kazakhstani champions and the like.

 

[Blue Wiz]

Bearing in mind your signature, are you absolutely 100% sure as sure can be that that is 100% sure as sure can be correct?
Might there still be a seeding system where countries allowed only one CL spot play against champions from countries allocated two, three or four CL spots.
In essence, might the european powerhouse league champions end up playing versus the kazakhstani champions and the like.

Depending on their country coefficients the best teams in the top leagues go directly into the groupstage, but the last placed team in each of those countries have to qualify, just as before. The difference is that each of those teams will face another team that hasn't won their league. So the winner of the Swedish League will only face winners from other countries on their way to the CL groupstage and won't face teams from the bigger countries. My guess is that they want more countries in the groupstage and this way will make sure that at least 5 champions from lower rankes countries will enter the groupstage (looking at country coefficient that would be Greece, Denmark, Chech republic, Bulgaria and Serbia).

 

[SuitsBlueX2]

So it is an effort to expand the reputation of the competition to currently lesser (footballing) nations, I suspect with an eye on selling the tv rights at a later date when interest is significantly improved.