RSS feed

UEFA Champions League Redux

The UEFA Champions League is the most unique sporting competition in the planet. No other sport has the sheer number of teams to be able to field a competition that is so large and so well contested. At first glance, it may seem that its simply the best European teams play each other in a tournament with some funky rules regarding home and away games, and determine who reigns supreme. But its more, its called the Champions League for a reason. It’s not a tournament, but rather a near year-long quest to be crowned champion of Europe. Who gets to play? Why do we make such a big deal about it every year? Why is it going to be great this year, and who’s going to win it all?

So who can take part in this elite league with high stakes? Well, as the name might suggest, the Champions do. Let’s get some formalism out of the way – UEFA stands for the Union of European Football Associations. So that means its membership is made up of the Football Associations (FAs) of different European countries (i.e. the English, Spanish, Italian, French, German, etc.). In all UEFA has 53 member associations, and believe it or not, every last one of them has a chance to take home the cake.

Surely, it’s harder, but they can still manage to do it. UEFA ranks its FAs 1 to 53, and then the champions of the last four countries’ top league play each other in the very first round of play. The winners then join up with the next 32 teams (those who have won the leagues of the countries ranked 17 to 49—except Liechtenstein), and duke it out. The winners join up with the next three teams up the ladder and clash again, leaving ten. These ten teams then play each other in a playoff, with the five winning teams getting a bid into the group stages. All the while, these matchups are not just one game at a time, but rather two. The acknowledged home field advantage is then eliminated by having a game played at each team’s home venue, and using any goals scored as the away team as a tiebreaker.

So about now is when everyone starts paying attention. The playoff takes the format that more people might have heard of. First, the teams that survived the series of initial filters get split up into groups that include more teams that faced yet a more grueling selection process (teams that didn’t actually win their domestic leagues), and the champions and runners-ups of the highest ranked associations. In all, 32 teams are split into eight groups of four. They play each other in a round robin style, two games each (home and away), with the top two teams from each group advancing. Then comes the long winter break. The remaining 16 teams find themselves playing either this week or last week, in the first leg of the first elimination round. Again this stage has a home and away leg and the winner on aggregate goes on.

As the competition continues, the field narrows to 8, and then 4, and then two. The final is played on neutral ground and is a one-shot deal. In all, the competition takes up almost the entire year, with the first leg of the preliminary qualification games occurring in late June and early July, and the final taking place in late May. So from this comes the notion that it is more than a tournament; it is indeed a League. More so than the domestic leagues, it has more grandeur and hype surrounding it, since it doesn’t require your favorite team to win to prove that your team is better than another. Say your favorite team comes in second in your domestic league. Should the team that won the league beat out a highly touted team like those from England, Spain or Italy, it counts as a victory for you. The little guy beat the big guy, and chances are, at some point, your team beat the team you came in second to. So using hooligan logic, your team is better than those privileged, deep-pocketed giants.

So who do we have this year, at our Stage of 16. Representing England is Arsenal, Chelsea, and Manchester United. From Italy hails AC Milan, Inter Milan, and Fiorentina. Spain brings Barcelona, Real Madrid, and Sevilla to the table, while France provides Bordeaux and Lyon. Germany puts forth two teams in Stuttgart and Bayern Munich, while the last three teams are FC Porto of Portugal, Olympiacos of Greece, and CSKA Moscow of Russia. One can essentially determine favorites by looking at their popularity here in the US, with the three English teams, Real Madrid and defending Champions Bacrelona looking best.

But the whole beauty of the Champions League is that at this stage, there are no real blowouts. UEFA is able to field a set of 16 teams that are all highly competitive (what’s more, there are some upsets in the teams that didn’t even make it past the group stages – just ask Liverpool). And that’s what is so fantastic about this time of year. All the fair-weather fans, band-wagon riders and trend-spotting fans get it all back in their face when their seemingly invincible team gets a reality check from an unsuspecting foe. FC Porto and Lyon beat Arsenal and Real Madrid respectively in the opening leg of their matchup. Neither team was expected to win, but now they have put added pressure on their opponents to perform when they match up again in two weeks.

So as the Olympics begin to wind down, take some time to focus on what will surely be the best warm-up to the World Cup anyone could ask for – a highly competitive field of Champions League play. Between now and the May 22^nd showdown in Madrid for the Champions League Final, Europe’s top teams will be duking it out every other week(ish) to claim supremacy over European soccer, so tune on in!

But where was I going when I mentioned earlier that no other sport has such depth to provide such a competitive field of opponents? Surely, I was talking about how UEFA and European soccer in particular is very dominant in the world stage. But in fact, this entire UEFA Champions League serves only to determine the best Club team in Europe. The European Champion will later get a chance to face off with the North and Central American, South American, African, Oceanic, and Asian champions in FIFA’s Club World Cup. So for anyone doubting the sheer number of soccer fans and devotees out there, simply imagine the complexities that go into determining a European Champion and do it five more times; now you have champions for each of the continents. On top of that, organize a tournament to determine their champion, and then it all comes into perspective.

More to the point, however, is a little prediction time!!! Who do I think will take home the prize in Europe this May? I’d have to pick Barcelona, even in light of their poor performance on Tuesday against Stuttgart. It may not be their results, but the style of their play. The way in which they have opponents hanging by a thread with the threat of a goal at any moment just lingering for the entire 90 minutes. But surely, I will be proven wrong, and it may come at the hands of another favorite, say an English team, but hopefully it’ll come at the hands of a lesser known, but equally respectable team, just to spice things up a bit