Liverpool already have an early advantage for next season’s revamped Champions League
Liverpool will be back in the Champions League next season, and they’ve already been handed an early advantage just under four months out from the commencement of a new format for the competition.
The group phase as we know it will no longer be in use, with the 36 competing teams instead forming one extended table which’ll be used for determining the composition of the knockout stage.
Instead of playing home-and-away against three clubs in a single group, the Reds will have one game each against eight separate opponents in the new league phase, facing two teams from each of the four seeding pots.
As per Daily Express, the nine teams who’ll comprise Pot 1 for next season’s Champions League have been confirmed, and Liverpool are one of them, earning their place as a top seed due to their advantageous UEFA coefficient, which takes into account a club’s performance in Europe over a five-year period.
Manchester City, Bayern Munich, Real Madrid, Paris Saint-Germain, Inter Milan, Borussia Dortmund, RB Leipzig and Barcelona are also seeded into the highest pot, so Arne Slot will only have to face two of those eight in the league phase.
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Theoretically at least, Liverpool have a plausible chance of finishing among the top eight of the revamped league phase and duly securing direct qualification for the round of 16.
With the teams placed from 9th to 24th entering a play-off round, the Reds should be well able to make it beyond the first stage of the new Champions League format, with their strong performances in the tournament under Jurgen Klopp now standing to them.
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There will still be some formidable opponents to face, and not just from Pot 1 either – we could potentially have to face each of Bayer Leverkusen, Atletico Madrid, AC Milan and Slot’s former club Feyenoord depending on the final composition of the four seeding pots.
However, the fact that we’re talking about Liverpool meeting such illustrious opposition right from the get-go in Europe is a reflection of how much they’ve improved from 12 months ago, when we knew that we’d be top seeds in the Europa League but come up against less than world-beating competition in the group stage.
Every single result will count hugely towards the final league table, so there’ll be no scope for the Reds to let up even if they blitz their previous games. The new format will take getting used to, but we’re just glad that LFC are part of it after missing out this season.
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