Football | Everything you need to know about the 2024/25 Champions League: new format, pots, draw, date and time

The fundamental change proposed by UEFA for the Champions League in the 2024/25 season is to abandon the classic group stage format to focus on a format more reminiscent of the major football leagues.

The first novelty is that, on this occasion, 36 teams will take part in the European competitioninstead of 32 as was the case until last season.

From eight groups with 32 teams to a ‘league’ of 36

With the new format, the teams will play eight games instead of the usual six in the old group stage and all will compete in the same league phase.

The eight matches that each team must play do not follow the home and away format, but the matches are played against each other. eight different rivalsfour at home and the other four away.

According to UEFA, “in this way, clubs will have the opportunity to face a greater number of rivals and increases the chances of seeing the best teams face off in the early stages of the competition.”

How do teams make it to the round of 16? Here’s how the knockout format changes

There are two options to advance to the knockout round of the Champions League: finishing in the top eight teams in the group stage or winning a two-legged play-off tie in the event of finishing between 9th and 24th place. The teams that finish below will not have the possibility of continuing in any European competition, as was the case in previous editions.

In view of the play-off phase to advance to the round of 16, the teams between 9th and 16th place will be seeded teamsso they will play the return match at home. The winners of this new round prior to the round of 16 will play against a team that finished among the top eight in the group stage with ‘home field advantage’ for those who were seeded in the first phase.

From the round of 16 onwards, the qualifiers follow the same development than in recent seasons.

Are the competition dates changing?

According to UEFA, the Champions League and Europa League matches of the new ‘group stage’ will be played between September and January.

There will be a exclusive week Champions League matches, with matches being played on Tuesdays, Wednesdays and Thursdays. On the last day, all matches will be played simultaneously.

This is how the drums are composed and the date of the draw

The drums are formed by nine teams in each of the four pots. The draw takes place on Thursday, August 29th from 6:00 p.m. (Spanish time) at the already legendary UEFA headquarters in Nyon.

Firstly, the teams from pot 1 will be drawn, with Real Madrid as the top seed. Each team must play one home game and one away game against two rivals from each pot.

With the limitation of never playing against a team from the same country or doing so with a maximum of two teams from another leagueon this occasion a computer program is in charge of designing the calendar for each team.