Some football pundits have already predicted that the winners of the Uefa Champions League tournament in 2025 will be the very same team that won it in 2024. But if Real Madrid do end up defending their title, it will be after winning a competition with a very different format.
Gone now are the familiar group stages, which saw eight groups of four sides compete to progress to the knock-out stage. In their place is a single league of 36 (four extra) clubs.
So instead of playing three home and three away matches against selected group opponents, clubs will now play four away matches and four home matches against opponents randomly selected by a computer algorithm. There will be no repeat matches between two teams.
After those matches are played, the top eight placed teams will secure a place in the “round of 16”. The 12 clubs placed from 25th to 36th will be eliminated.
But the clubs finishing from ninth to 24th place in the league table will get a chance to make a comeback through a two-legged knock-out playoff. During this phase, teams ranked from ninth to 16th will play against one of the teams ranked 17th-24th. The eight winners out of these playoffs will then join the eight teams which have already progressed.
At this point, the round of 16 stage will revert to the usual Champions League format of a two-legged (home and away) knock-out competition, with winning sides moving on to quarter-finals, semi-finals and then the single-legged final.
For both fans and teams, the new system will take some getting used to. And as with many things (everything?) in football, the decision to make the change has divided opinion.
Uefa has called it a “historic moment”. Others have been critical, questioning the motives of the new system’s introduction. Some even think the change is a direct result of the controversial and doomed project to create a European Super League.
But it’s possible football may benefit.
To begin with, it may make the whole event more competitive, and less dominated by just a few clubs. A recent study which compared the old and new formats simulating 5,000 matches agrees with this observation. The study also suggests that the ratio of “dead rubber” matches – where progress is not at stake – may fall to 2%, compared to 15% in the previous format.
Another big change in the new format is that less importance is given to historic performance for seedings (or rankings) when it comes to the first group of fixtures. Instead, the new format gives a higher weighting to current season performance.
Within the tournament, every game in the first stage will have a potential impact for next round seeding and future opponent match up. This gives every club fresh motivation to perform, and avoid additional playoff games. Clubs pushing for higher seeds can lead to greater tactical dilemmas about whether or not to rest star players.
From a financial point of view, teams participating in the new format Champions League will benefit from a participation fee of £13.4 million – £2.3 million more than last year. Overall, the total prize money available has increased by 33% to £771 million.
Uefa itself is set to earn around £196.6 million, but they claim that non participating clubs and qualifying round clubs will benefit from €440 million (£371 million) through plans to fund football at all levels across Europe.
Fantasy formatFor the clubs involved in the Champions League, the new format will mean more matches and more time on the pitch – a maximum of 17 games for the two most successful teams, up from 13. And that’s on top of a football schedule that some feel is already too congested.
More matches means more chances of injuries. Last season, the number of player injuries in the Premier League increased by 11%, with some teams losing up to 22 players.
Not many Premier League clubs have increased their squad depth this summer, putting players’ performance and safety at further risk. Just before the new Champions League started, Manchester City midfielder Rodri said that players were “close to going on strike”.
Uefa has acknowledged player burnout and increased fixture congestion, but they also insist there is no question of changing the competition fixture.
For fans, how they react to the new Champions League format could boil down to whether or not they find it more entertaining. After all, relatively smaller club fans will get the opportunity to visit some historic football venues, and less fancied clubs have the potential to cause upsets throughout the tournament.
But as ever, they’ll have to pay for it. There has already been disquiet about ticket prices at Aston Villa, who are back in the European top flight.
More games on offer could end up reducing attendance and enthusiasm. And in that sense, Uefa have made quite a gamble with their new format. But it’s unlikely that we’ve reached a point where fans think there’s too much football just yet.
