By Enrique Gómez (Fox Deportes)
After the draw, the 8 duels for the Champions League playoffs were defined.
It may seem like a Champions League final, but in reality it is a preliminary elimination phase to define who will advance to the round of 16 of the tournament. Real Madrid and Manchester City, two of the biggest tanks in world soccer, were drawn to face each other.
The draw for the UEFA Champions League playoffs was held and the eight duels were defined for this (brand new) intermediate round between the league phase and the ‘finals’ of the tournament, where the teams that finished the first round between 9th and 24th place compete.
Thus the clashes that will qualify the other eight eighth finalists:
– Brest (18th) vs Paris Saint Germain (15th), yes two French teams.
– Brugge (24th) vs Atalanta (9th)
– Manchester City (22nd) vs Real Madrid (11th), the two most valuable clubs in the world
– Juventus (20th) vs PSV (14th)
– Monaco (17th) vs Benfica (16th)
– Sporting (23rd) vs Borussia Dortmund (10th)
– Celtic (21st) vs Bayern Munich (12th)
– Feyenoord (19th) vs Milan (13th), Santiago Gimenez vs his former team?
Except for Juventus and Milan, the rest of the matches had their ideal counterparts in terms of competition; for example, the best qualified team (Atalanta, who finished 9th) will face the worst placed team in the playoffs (Club Brugge, who just missed out on 24th place), while the two teams closest in the qualifying table (16th and 17th) will play against each other.
This is possible because for this draw, the qualified clubs were divided in sequence of pairs (9th and 10th; 11th and 12th; 13th and 14th; 15th and 16th; 17th and 18th; 19th and 20th; 21st and 22nd; 23rd; 24th) and the best pair had in its key the worst, the second best the second worst and so on. In six of the eight crossings, the best of the first pair was drawn against the worst of the other group. Only the two Italian clubs ‘broke the rules’.
In other words, although Real Madrid could have faced Celtic, they ended up facing City.
The matches are round-robin, starting on February 11, and the winners will join the round of 16 of the Champions League, which starts on March 4.
