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Author: bert.kassies
Date: 23-06-2007, 17:42

The UEFA Exco decided today that there will be only slight changes in the access modalities:

"The committee also discussed the future format of the European club competitions from 2009 to 2012, in particular the UEFA Champions League. "There will be no changes to the core format [of eight groups of four teams each>, but the access modalities will change slightly," said Mr Platini, who added that further discussions on the matter will take place later in the summer, with a decision to be taken at the Executive Committee meeting in Istanbul in September."

See uefa.com.

Author: Ricardo
Date: 25-06-2007, 08:41

Sorry for the Dutch. vi.nl says that CL stays the same except for some minor changes int he qualifications:
"Platini wil bijvoorbeeld dat de titelhouder direct een plaats krijgt in de volgende editie van de Champions League. De laatste twee winnaars, Liverpool en AC Milan, moe(s)ten zich door de voorronde worstelen."

Translation: "Platinin wants for instance that the titleholder will get a direct spot in the next edition of the CL. The lat 2 winners, Liverpool and Milan, had to go through qualification rounds"

I have the feeling thse guys completely missed the understanding of Platini's words. Titleholders already don't have to play qualification rounds. Probably it was about domestic cupwinners who should have a spot in the CL........

Re: Champions League 2009-2012
Author: larare Date: 29-06-2007, 00:42	Ricardos guess is supported by this Yahoo article.

Author: panther
Date: 03-07-2007, 19:17
Edited by: panther
at: 03-07-2007, 19:49

A friend of mine read in a dutch newspaper that Platini is thinking to change the preliminary round. According to this plan from 2009-10 Champions League the system will be as follows

32 TEAMS
Direct to the Groups Phase: 22 Teams
- The winner of the Champions League final
- Spain: 1st, 2nd, 3rd of the Championship
- Italy: 1st, 2nd, 3rd of the Championship
- England: 1st, 2nd, 3rd of the Championship
- France: 1st, 2nd of the Championship
- Germany: 1st, 2nd of the Championship
- Portugal: 1st, 2nd of the Championship
- Countries seeded from 7th to 12 in UEFA’s ranking: 1st of the Championship

PRELIMINARY ROUNDS: 10 TEAMS
The Champions of the Countries seeded 13th to 53 in UEFA ranking: 6 places
The Cup Winners of the Countries seeded 1st to 16 in UEFA ranking: 4 places

Re: Champions League 2009-2012
Author: drvasko98 Date: 03-07-2007, 19:22	Is this a true? Is this a desided yet?

Re: Champions League 2009-2012
Author: panther Date: 03-07-2007, 19:39	He told me that they write that it is just a thought

Author: badgerboy
Date: 03-07-2007, 19:42
Edited by: badgerboy
at: 03-07-2007, 19:49

"Is this a true? Is this a desided yet?"

Nothing has been decided yet. I don't think anything is going to be until September. It's just one of the "ideas" being discussed.

As for the idea. Well I've heard Platini say before that the 3rds from the top countries would get direct access to the CL (but that was in exchange for losing the 4th team completely). I'm surprised there's a chance that will still happen.

4 of the top 16 Cup Winners. I don't really like Cup Winners in at all - though presumably often this will actually be the 4th, 3rd or 2nd in the league anyway. And two qualifying rounds to reduce the 16 to 4. Quite OK.

No mention of the Champions of countries 13-15 but I assume that's a mistake. They would be included in the qualifiers - so there would be 6 places fought out by 40 teams - still 3 qualifying rounds with 32 playing QR1 (Champions of 21-52), & the Champions of 13-20 joining the winners to play two qualifying rounds.

In terms of "diversity" you are now guaranteed 18 different countries (indeed 18 domestic Champions) will participate. In theory this number could increase - if Champions of 13-16 fail to qualify but domestic cup winners (or league runners-up) do.

"Quality" - the top teams that are there now will still have the chance to qualify if they are good enough - with two places lost for the top six countries (not a massive loss). It will get much tougher for runners-up (second teams) from the countries ranked from 7-15 to qualify but much easier for most of their Champions (either via direct access or easier qualifying opponents). Probably the countries from 7-9 get the rawest deal - no gain for their Champions (who already have direct access) but much harder for their runners-up.

Overall not too bad - except I'd ditch the "Cup Winners idea" and just have the 16 lowest ranked qualifiers from the 16 countries with more than one spot playing off.

Author: Aliceag
Date: 03-07-2007, 20:58

I like the idea of 7-12 champion to have direct acess. I still remember that year when Portugal was 10th, and had no team at all in the CL!

I think for medium countries 7-12 it's a better deal to have 1 guaranteed place and a tough second and an even tougher CW, than 2 not guaranteed places...

I like the idea of cupwinners also. Can put more competitivity in the Cup itself and if the winner is a "nono" then that winner would be eliminated so it would never reach CL anyway. But in order for this to work better, I support first the idea that internally, the cups should be decided at 2 hands in QF and SF. That gives more chances to avoid "lucky winners" in the Cups.

I still mantain that the berths should be revised too, so that 7-12 ranked countries should all have 5 places in EC and not that 6-4 gap.

1 CL direct
1 CL pre round
1 Cup winner pre round
2 UC

this way we can have 1-3 CL spots to any 7-12 country, and 2-4 UC spots. seems fair.

Author: putzeijs
Date: 04-07-2007, 11:34

Badger,

I aggree we have to wait to september, so discussing rumours is not always fair.

But I don't understand your "It will get much tougher for the runners up from countries 7-15" When I read the topic from panther, I don't find those runners-up. So they are totally out of scope (except when they should be cup-winner).

If these information would be correct, UEFA should also change the entering systhem for UEFA-cup. More runners up to UC, and probably more losers from the qualifiers too.

Author: Ricardo
Date: 04-07-2007, 12:12

Me too see the greatest berth lying in the runners up of place 7-15 that are not in this proposal at all. It looks like top 15 changes a qualification spot for a Cupwinner spot. The ones that get something back is the top-3: a 3rd guaranteed team and 10-15, they too get a guaranteed spot now.

So if you think that top-4 will win the Cupwinners play-off, and spot9-15 already needed a miracle getting a second team in CL before. spot5-8 are the victims. Now they need to win against a top-4 country, while before they needed a win against a non seeded tem in Q3 of country 10-20.

It is an interesting proposal, more diversity, a bit less quality probably: a top-5 cupwinner out, while a(more?) champion of country 20-25 is in.
And how will a team be replaced if a team qualifies by league and by cupwinner? -> next in league or cuploser..

Author: badgerboy
Date: 04-07-2007, 14:20

Putzeijs

Yes I realise that the runners-up from 7-15 are now out. I just meant the "second team" from those countries whether that be runners-up or cup winners. If the prestige of the cups is raised as UEFA hopes you'd expect the biggest clubs to go all out to win it in any case & so a lot of runners-up & Cup winners might match (or there will be more "domestic doubles").

As to the "cup losers or runners-up" question from Ricardo. It would be ludicrous to include cup losers - especially seeing as UEFA are planning on ditching them even from the UEFA Cup.

As this is still only "for discussion" though I'm still hoping UEFA might adopt something close to it but without the "Cup Winner" angle - so the runners-up down to 15 (plus from 16 who gain something) get to be whittled down to 4.

One worry domestically is that - if winning the Cup becomes so important - there might be calls for seeding to prevent the sort of unbalanced draws that gets the likes of Millwall to a final. Even with cup losers out how tempted might teams in certain countries be to "not try too hard" in the Cup Final if they already have the league sown up & losing to a "lowly" team in the Final would kick their bitter rivals out of the CL.

From a coefficient perspective it would seem that place 12 would become extremely important (or possibly place 13 if the freeing up of the CL holder spot means room for another Champion with direct access?) and also spot 16 (who get a second team in the CL qualifiers when now they only have one).

Re: Champions League 2009-2012
Author: peter_nyc Date: 04-07-2007, 15:38 Edited by: peter_nyc at: 04-07-2007, 15:45	This sistem is a trap for eastern- European countries. Why ? Because the cup winners from countries 1-7 most likely would be seeded in last qualification round and most likely will end up in the group stage anyway. So, for the countries 1-6 , if with actual system they have only 2 directly in the GS, with the new system most likely they will have 3 or 4 guaranteed there.

Author: badgerboy
Date: 04-07-2007, 18:08

"This sistem is a trap for eastern- European countries. Why ? Because the cup winners from countries 1-7 most likely would be seeded in last qualification round and most likely will end up in the group stage anyway".

But if the article is right then only 4 of these Cup Winners willbe able to qualify.

It does surprise me that the proposal is to give more "direct access" to teams from top countries but then you could argue that all these teams are expected to qualify anyway (certainly seeded to do so) - Toulouse being the one exception this year and if you are unseeded in the qualifiers the teams you really want to avoid are those from England, Italy & Spain. This way you know you don't get them in the qualifiers.

This year you would have:

Direct access (Teams "promoted" to direct access in bold)

Milan
Real Madrid
Barcelona
Sevilla
Inter
Roma
Lazio
Manchester United
Chelsea
Liverpool
Lyon
Marseille
Stuttgart
Schalke
Porto
Sporting
PSV
Olympiakos
CSKA Moscow
Dinamo Bucharest
Celtic
Anderlecht

Cup winners - teams that would now be avoided by Champions from lower countries in italics.

Valencia (4th as Sevilla won the Cup)
Palermo? (5th as Milan take TH spot & Roma won the Cup)
Arsenal (4th as Chelsea won the Cup)
Sochaux (Cup Winners replace Toulouse)
FC Nurnberg (Cup Winners replace Werder Bremen)
Benfica (3rd as Sporting won the Cup)
Ajax (Cup winners as well as 2nd)
AE Larissa (Cup Winners replace AEK)
Lokomotiv Moscow (Cup Winners replace Spartak Moscow)
Rapid Bucharest (Cup Winners replace Steaua Bucharest)
Rangers (2nd as Celtic won the Cup)
Club Brugge (Cup Winners replace Genk)
Shakhtar Donetsk (2nd as Dinamo Kiev won the Cup)
Slavia Praha (2nd as Sparta won the Cup)
Besiktas (Cup Winners as well as runners-up)
FC Basel (Cup Winners of country 16)

I added Palermo as a 5th Italian team but it's not clear if this is correct. This is just for "illustrative purposes" though so - based purely on seeding - Arsenal, Valencia, Benfica & Ajax would be expected to qualify.

Remaining Champions

Dinamo Kiev 38.726
Levski Sofia 38.112
Sparta Praha 37.851
Fenerbahce 36.791
Rosenborg 31.509
Red Star Belgrade 19.526
FC Kobenhavn 19.129
Dinamo Zagreb 17.533
DVSC Debrecen 11.675
FC Zurich 9.869
FC Salzburg 9.104
APOEL Nicosia 6.492
Beitar Jerusalem 6.338
Zaglebie Lubin 5.609
NK Domzale 5.272
IF Elfsborg 4.478
FK Sarajevo 4.190
FK Ventspils 3.860
MSK Zilina 3.575
Derry City 3.145
(the rest less than 3.000)

The top six on the list would be seeded to qualify (only two of them are seeded currently) but all teams on the list would surely consider their chances of reaching the group stage far stronger than it is currently. Just look at all the teams (bolded & in italics above) that they would now avoid...

Re: Champions League 2009-2012
Author: bigriazor Date: 04-07-2007, 21:43	Does nobody see a problem in this??Do we really want the cup winner to replace a team that finished 2/3/4 in domestic league?Best example is Larisa replacing AEK...or you could have Getafe in a better day and they would have beaten Sevilla...Introducing cup winners in UCL is kind of ilogical..

Re: Champions League 2009-2012
Author: eldaec Date: 04-07-2007, 23:54	Platini is just trying to change something after his insane election ravings about attempting to lower the quality of teams in the CL didn't come off. In all probability this sillyness will be tossed on the ever growing pile of his abandoned hare-brained schemes long before anyone has to worry aout it.

Author: Overgame
Date: 05-07-2007, 16:12

"Best example is Larisa replacing AEK...or you could have Getafe in a better day and they would have beaten Sevilla"

Many "big" teams from the top 16 prefer ending 2nd/"rd or even 4th for the top3 than trying to win the Cup. With that system, there are almost 0 chance to see a small team winning the cup in those countries.

And, actually, i'd like to see a team who has won a title (National Cup) than a team who was 2nd or even 3rd in their league.

Re: Champions League 2009-2012
Author: Forza-AZ Date: 05-07-2007, 16:34	Yes, think the Cups in the top 16 countries get more interesting. But it should always be the Cupwinners, and not losing finalists, that get the CL spot. When the Cupwinner already qualified for the CL via the league, then the next team in the league should get that CL-qualifying round spot.

Re: Champions League 2009-2012
Author: moro Date: 05-07-2007, 17:50	I like the ideea. A system that does not evoluate is an older system year after year. It's a good thing to try something else. And it's also good thing to boost another competition - in case your favorite team had a disastrous start or ending of the ch-ship, they still have another pair of cards to play in the cup.

Author: Ricardo
Date: 06-07-2007, 09:21

What to do when a direct candidate wins the cup? Will then the next in league play the cup-play-off?

Problem I am having with this system that in the top countries it is mainly a top team that will win the cup, which will mean that it would be anyway that the next in league-teams will play the cup play-off.
And then it becomes just a split up of the Q2&Q3: top-16 countries and the rest.
This is not that bad for the top-4, but it is for the rest.

And another question. What happens with the cup-winner teams that will lose first round play-off? will they go to UC? That would mean 12 teams to UC, only 4 teams left for the other play offs?

Re: Champions League 2009-2012
Author: Forza-AZ Date: 06-07-2007, 12:08	Maybe the UEFA-cup system also changes, so more than 16 teams can come from CL-qualifying to UEFA-cup round 1 (?).

Author: Overgame
Date: 06-07-2007, 12:29
Edited by: Overgame
at: 06-07-2007, 12:32

Well, the UEFA Cup needs to change, since only 6 spots arz available for the countries ranked between the 13rd and 53rd place (except Liechtenstein) : 40 teams.

qR1 : 32 teams
qR2 : 24 teams (16+8)
qR3 : 12 teams

Or

qR1 : 28 teams
qR2 : 16 teams (14+4)
qR3 : 12 teams (8+4)

Or any similar system for the qRounds of the CL

The 'Cup qualifications' for the CL is easy :

qR1 : 16 teams
qR2 : 8 teams

For the UC, 2 possibilities :

1) No team from the CL in UC.
2) A change in the number of teams (only 4 from the 'Cup qualifications' ? 12 ? 6 from the qR3 ? 4+6 ? 12+6 ? All the teams out in the qRounds ?) And they could place the teams in the qRounds of the UC (Out in qR1 ===> qR1 of the UC, out in qR2 ===> qR2, out in qR3 ===> R1 and something similar for the 'Cup qualifications', qR1 ===> qR1 or qR2, etc). We'll see. But i like the last system :p

Author: jpcccc
Date: 11-07-2007, 04:03
Edited by: jpcccc
at: 11-07-2007, 05:01

I like the scheme and the overall idea. I also believe that clubs from top countries like it too.

More countries in CL means more TV audience and more money for the overall budget. This will be a compensation for sharing it with more countries, so no loss there.
However, it will also be shared between more countries where it really makes a difference. On the long run, it could make CL more competitive. Any loss of quality now can be overcome in the future.

Cup Winners qualification means top 3/4 countries have a good chance of getting their probable 4th spot by qualification just like today and still get a 3rd direct spot, so they won't complain.

Cup on top countries gets more interesting and we'll probably say goodbye to lucky winners and (maybe) even to small clubs as losing cup finalists. In fact, it simply becomes another internal competition to generate extra income. League cups might stop being 'needed'.

In fact, that top 16 Cup Winners qualifying is a bit like the return of the old Cup Winners Cup, even if with no final winner and incorporated in CL. Back in the old days, CWC semi-finalists had the same level as the best of national Champions, so this only puts them where they belong.

Now let's wait for the implications in a new proposed scheme for UC.

Author: Ricardo
Date: 12-07-2007, 08:37

Regarding the top5-10 I am thinking it is a bad idea. There is less chance for the second team to qualify. This can have strange impact on the money distribution.
Like in Holland last year it was strange for PSV to get a double marketshare. That gave them an extra 8 Mln euro or so.
I suppose when structurely the Dutch Cupwinner/second in league does not qualify:
1. the champion is getting richer and richer, taking more distance from the others/top-clubs will get into trouble when missing out on CL a couple of times...
2. the TV will pay less for the CL, as there is only 1 participant in stead of 2.

Author: kurt
Date: 18-07-2007, 17:47

if for the last 4 places , the ' cup winners ' of the country ranked 1-16, 4 go through, this will be for 95 % 4 clubs of the big 5.

But if all the losers will not go to the uefacup, playing the qualify-rounds and out of europe , then this will be the worst scenorio for all the countries ranked 5-16, no more second team of belgium, turkey,portugal, netherlands, this is very bad for the subtop countries.

so, no catch up net, the big 5 will become even bigger.

Re: Champions League 2009-2012
Author: Overgame Date: 18-07-2007, 18:57	If there is no seeding, i highly doubt to see the "big 5" always qualified, they could play against each other. Usualy, the cup is not always won by a top team. And don't forget that a team like Benfica can win against too, etc. No, the system is not that bad, let's see what happens.

Re: Champions League 2009-2012
Author: kurt Date: 18-07-2007, 19:28	no seeding, that will be joke, there will always be seeding

Re: Champions League 2009-2012
Author: MartinW Date: 19-07-2007, 04:24	You can see in Badgerboy's post above that if this system is used for this year and there is seeding, then the 4 cup winners expected to go through would be Arsenal, Valencia, Benfica, Ajax. So there would be no qualification for the team from Ita, Fra or Ger.

Author: kurt
Date: 19-07-2007, 11:57
Edited by: kurt
at: 19-07-2007, 12:17

this will be the same as in the past, the previous years also 1 or 2 teams of the big 5 fail to get the champions league

so now the maximum is : 3*4 + 2*3 = 18 teams of big 5 with 1 or 2 fails

in the future : 3*3 + 2*2 + 4 ( cup ) = 17 teams, so the maximum is lowered, what is good but here i think maximum 1 team out of the big 5 wil not made it

the new system is excellent if all the teams who does not make it for the last 4 places will go to uefacup