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Last updated on August 28th, 2021 at 04:19 pm
UEFA announced plans for big changes to the Champions League format. All 55 UEFA members will discuss the details at a virtual meeting tomorrow. The changes will come into effect in 2024.
With this proposal UEFA is trying to satisfy the big clubs like Barcelona and Real Madrid (with their plan to launch a largely closed breakaway competition), and to maintain qualification through domestic leagues.
How will the Champions League format change?
UEFA’s proposal is to increase the number of teams within the group stage from 32 to 36. However, this change would not be so significant. More importantly, the current Champion’s League system of eight groups may be transformed to a new format. The plan is to use a variation of the so-called “Swiss system.”
All 36 teams will be placed into a single league table, with opponents determined based on pre-season ranking positions. The overall ranking will determine the participants in the eliminations. The first eight will continue automatically for the 1/8 finals, while the next 16 teams will eventually play playoffs, which will determine the other eight participants in the 1/8 finals.
England, Spain, Italy and Germany currently have four guaranteed slots in the group stage. But leading teams who don’t make the top four of their leagues could still qualify. The fourth additional spot could go to France, which currently only has 2 guaranteed group-stage slots while a third team has to go through qualifying.
This means that the number of tournament games may jump from 125 to 225 games. The European Leagues are concerned about how the extra games can fit in the “already very congested calendar”. However, the chairman Lars-Christer Olsson said it would be possible to squeeze the dates.
Increasing the number of games would also mean that UEFA may not have 96 group-stage games, but 180 games that can be sold to TV broadcasters. This will lead to increase of the revenue for the clubs and UEFA if the Champions League format changes.
