UEFA watch 2017-18

Celtic made a valiant effort to throw away a 5-0 first leg lead

 

Sevilla were winning 2-0 on the night and 4-1 on aggregate with about 15 minutes left.
They're now drawing 2-2 and another goal for their Turkish opponents would put them out.
Nervous time for them with a few minutes to go.

 

That went well.................

 

Pot 1 coef. Pot 2 coef.
------------------------ --- ---------------- ------------------------ --- ----------------
Real Madrid Esp 176.999 FC Barcelona Esp 151.999
Bayern München Ger 154.899 Atlético Madrid Esp 142.999
Chelsea Eng 106.192 Paris Saint-Germain Fra 126.333
Juventus Ita 140.666 Borussia Dortmund Ger 124.899
Benfica Por 111.866 Sevilla *4 Esp 112.999
AS Monaco Fra 62.333 Manchester City Eng 100.192
Spartak Moscow Rus 18.606 FC Porto Por 98.866
Shakhtar Donetsk Ukr 87.526 Manchester United Eng 95.192

Pot 3 coef. Pot 4 coef.
------------------------ --- ---------------- ------------------------ --- ----------------
Napoli *4 Ita 88.666 Celtic ** Sco 42.785
Tottenham Hotspur Eng 77.192 CSKA Moscow *3 Rus 39.606
FC Basel Sui 74.415 FC København ** Den 37.800
Olympiakos Piraeus *3 Gre 64.580 Sporting CP Lisbon *4 Por 36.866
Anderlecht Bel 58.480 APOEL Nicosia ** Cyp 26.210
Liverpool *4 Eng 56.192 Feyenoord Ned 23.212
AS Roma Ita 53.666 NK Maribor ** Slo 21.125
Besiktas Tur 45.840 RB Leipzig Ger 15.899

 

If you reply to B&W's post, it is suddenly formatted!

 

So Bayern, Barca, Spurs and CSKA Moscow (for the travelling)

 

Common sense dictates our group will look like this...
Shakhtar Donestsk
Barcelona
Spurs
CSKA Moscow

...or like this...
Juventus
Barcelona
Spurs
Taurine FC Leipzig

 

It has been pointed out on twitter that our all 4 teams from our last Europa league group - are all in this years champions league draw - I would take being drawn with Monaco and Qarabag again this year. Though I would like to see us play one of real biggies this time around.

 

And 2 very littlies

 

For an "easier" group,

I'd like our group to be:

Benfica
Sevilla
Tottenham
Maribor

That would cut out any travelling, as well as any of the big ones.

But then again, what's the CL if you don't get a Bayern, Barca or RM in your group? I'd certainly rather have a big team like those, rather than having to travel to outer Europe.

 

The CL group stage draw blurb starts today,
midnight Beijing local time.

 

Any of the group 2 teams will be tough opposition, so we need to pray for a little pot 1 team

 

aah we are discussing the draw on this thread

 

I'm in two minds about this. On the one hand, we don't stand a chance of winning it so I'd rather we get a group full of big teams so that the players get the experience and the fans get the spectacle.

But on the other hand, it is a case of 'be careful what you wish for' as I'd then be nervous of us becoming the laughingstock of the tournament (a vacant role now that Arsenal aren't in it) and finish bottom of our group with 2 points and a -14 goal difference.

There's a fine line that manages to straddle spectacle + experience + dignity, and I would say it would be drawing one giant, one team roughly our level and one work experience kid...and we'd aim to qualify in 2nd place. So something like:

Real
Spurs
Porto
Celtic

Would be quite a tasty group.

 

If history repeats itself, get real Madrid will not want
to draw Spurs in the group stage.

 

Why not?

 

Ask Inter Milan what happened in 2010.

 

Don't mind getting Real at all. No matter what the score is, you're playing the best team in the world, so it doesn't matter.
But I don't want Celtic or Porto.
Porto are one of those teams that have nothing to lose and would be the exact sort of outfit that would turn us over, and make us an embarrassment.
And Celtic, with the pressure of it being England Vs Scotland, could easily do the same. A defeat to Celtic and that tops the jokes that football fans have made about Arsenal's CL campaigns over the years. They may have faced back to back 5-1 defeats to Bayern recently, but it was Bayern!!
Celtic are just the sort of team to come to Wembley and make us an embarrassment. No thank you!

 

We can dream...

Bayern finish 3rd in their group and drop down to the EL to face Arsenal in the knock out stages.