How the UEFA Champions League works?

Many of us who are new to the football world have been wondering about this question, about how the greatest ever competition in the whole Europe really works?

Today, I’m going to explain about this competition, how are the participants decided, how the qualify, how the winner is decided, what position does the winning team hold, it’s link to the UEFA Super Cup, and the Club World Cup, and why every club in Europe wants to win the trophy.

The UEFA Champions League was started in 1955 as a competition in the whole of Europe, to make clubs from all over the European countries compete against each other, and see which club was the best club, it was rebranded around 1990’s.

This competition consists of 32 teams which are selected from the domestic leagues of different countries. The number of teams each association enters into the UEFA Champions League is based upon the UEFA coefficients of the member associations. These scores are generated by the results of clubs representing each association during the previous five UEFA Champions League and UEFA Europa League seasons. The higher an association's coefficient, the more teams represent the association in the Champions League and the fewer qualification rounds the association's teams must compete in. Usually the number of participants for the top 5 leagues in Europe is 4, except for the Ligue 1, for which it is 3. This means that the teams who finish top 4 or 3 in their respective domestic leagues in the previous season qualify for the current season’s champions league.

These 32 teams are then randomly placed in 8 groups or pots consisting of 4 teams each. These teams then play against each other in a series of matches known as the group stage games. The teams play 2 matches against each team, one in their home ground, and the other in opponent teams home ground, after all the six matches have been completed the teams in each group are ranked on the basis of number of points obtained, where a team gets 3 points for a win, 1 point for a draw, and no points for a loss. If two or more teams have the same number of points, then the team is ranked according to goal difference, and if even then there is a clash, the ranking is done based on more number of away goals (number of goals scored in opponent’s home ground).

When the final ranking has been done the top 2 teams in each group qualify for the next round known as the Round of 16, and the team in who is third in each group gets transferred to UEFA Europa League. The Round of 16 is the beginning of eliminator rounds where two teams face each other, and the draw is decided using chits. The winning team qualifies to the quarter finals and the losing team gets eliminated. The Round of 16, quarter finals, and the semi finals are played in two legs, one leg in the team’s home ground and the second leg in the opponent team’s home ground, and the winner is decided on the basis of number of goals, i.e. the team which scores more goals combined of both legs gets the win, and if the teams stand equal on number of goals scored, the winner is decided of number of away goals, i.e. the team which has more away goals gets qualified to the next round, and even then if both the teams stand equal in number of away goals, the match is taken to extra time and then to penalty shootouts.

After successful completion of Round of 16, Quarter Finals, and the Semi-finals, when two teams remain, they face off each other in the final. The champions league final is a one leg match, where the two teams face each other in a jaw dropping match.

The winner of champions league is called the champion of Europe, and the club then qualifies for playing in the UEFA Super Cup, and the Club World Cup.

The UEFA Super Cup is a match played between the winner of the UEFA Champions League and the UEFA Europa League.

The Club World Cup, is an inter-continental competition organised by FIFA, and is played by 7 teams, consisting of the winner of each continental competition, and one team of the host country. In case of Europe the team which gets its place in the Club World Cup is the winner of the UEFA Champions League. However, the format of Club World Cup is changing from next year, i.e. from 2021, which we will discuss later in detail, but in short, the new format will have 8 teams from Europe, 6 from South Africa, 3 from Asia and CONCACAF, and 1 team from Oceania. The winner of the Club World Cup is announced as the ‘Best Club in the world’ and gets to wear the patch of Club World Cup on it’s jersey until the next winner is decided.

The most successful clubs in the UEFA Champions League have been Real Madrid (13 titles), AC Milan (7 titles), Bayern Munich (6 titles), Liverpool (6 titles), and FC Barcelona (5 titles).

For more information on top 5 domestic leagues in Europe check: https://mihirfootball.blogspot.com/2020/06/five-major-european-football-leagues.html

And, check top 200 blogs on football here (Passion Football is on 186 guys, we need to boost it up): https://blog.feedspot.com/soccer_blogs/