News: 2020-21 UEFA Champions League draw: The Road to Istanbul [R]

Man Utd can get wrecked haha

 

Man Shitty has the 'easiest' group on paper so far.

 

Gladbach would be the toughest draw by far, not much else to worry about in Pot 4 I think. I'd like to play one of the French clubs.

EDIT - great if we avoid 'gladbach automatically.

 

This groups is a like tennis one all high scorers. Too bad no one left is a high scoring team as they can't play Loko and Gladbach

So Marseille

edit: Marseille to City

 

Marseille got Shitty's group.

 

Barca
Juve
D Kiev
Ferencvaros

Not bad

 

Hard to see pot 3 or 4 hurting us or Juventus enough to knock either of us out. So just up to us to win the group. More interesting groups look like B - Real through but with any of 3 clubs, Inter favored but not assured. C - who joins City (any of the 3 others). D who joins Liverpool - Ajax or Atalanta? F - up for grabs among 4 clubs. H - who joins PSG, ManU or RB Leipzig?

I will look later at what bookies and 538 computer says post draw, but I don't expect big swings amongst the top 10 or so favorites, namely as the biggest name in Pot 3, Inter, will just be presumed to get by Shaktar and Gladbach by most bettors; rather than being matched up with strong pot 1 and 2 clubs in a true 'three contender group of death'. I do think ManU should take a hit from the outrageous 30:1 payoff, but I'm sure British bettors will both overlook Leipzig and also recall beating PSG. BVB should get a boost from bookies I think, esp. when they retain Jadon Sancho at close of window.

Very weird to have this draw while transfer windows are still open, unprecedented really, but that's 2020 for you.

 

Ajax lost a lot of players this transfer window even by their standards. Don't think they have much chance. That's one of the more clear-cut groups IMO. Liverpool first, Atalanta second, Ajax a distant third then Midtjylland.

Everyone seems to say Group H is the G.O.D, but I'd actually argue LPB got the G.O.D. this time (finally!!). In any case, B and H are super close:

H ........... B
PSG <-> LPB
Man Utd <-> Inter
Basaksehir <-> Donetsk
Leipzig <-> Borussia M

I just think Donetsk has way more European pedigree than the Turkish champions. Interestingly, they played Inter in the EL semifinal just a few weeks ago (5-nil to Inter).

 

Will still depend on national restrictions of course, which means empty stadiums in BCN. So suddenly Barca are looking at 2 true away matches and probably 4 matches behind closed doors in the group stage.

Man Utd's group also got tougher. They are probably looking at 3 true away fixtures and 3 neutral-site/no fans matches.

 

Good point on H & B but I think that Leipzig better than Gladbach, one was the 2nd toughest Pot 3 team and #9 ranked club in the world by 538, other was the toughest Pot 4 team and #28 in 538.

Adding all those Club ranking #s together though definitely confirms your point that B is G.O.D. with 4 teams in top 36. H is just a 3 horse race, but has 3 teams in top 11, fighting for 3 spots, which to me is also very G.O.D.

H ........... B
PSG #5 <-> LPB #6
Man Utd #11 <-> Inter #8
Basaksehir #164 <-> Donetsk #36
Leipzig #9<-> Borussia M #28

 

Yeah, I think those rankings underestimate the Turkish champions a lot. They did win thier EL group last season above Roma and Borussia M. But, hey, now I'm arguing against my previous post.

Since we have 3 CL matchdays on 3 consecutive mid-weeks, followed by a FIFA window and then 3 more consecutive midweeks of CL action, I think form will play a big part. And something like a slight hamstring pull can see a key player miss 3 matches.

 

Anyway, the next thing to look for is when do we play Juve? El clasico will be played on the Saturday between Matchday 1 and Matchday 2, so things could get difficult real quick. Especially if we have to play Juve away on the Wednesday prior or Tuesday after. Hopefully we play Juve on MD3 and 4.

Could get even trickier for LPB since the first clasico is in Camp Nou.

 

hmm... seems that the fixtures for the CL group-stage are still not out(?).

Anyway, here is the Europa League draw that was conducted a few hours ago:

Group A: Roma, Young Boys, CFR Cluj, CSKA Sofia
Group B: Arsenal, Rapid Wien, Molde, Dundalk
Group C: Leverkusen, Slavia Praha, Hapoel Beer-Sheva, Nice
Group D: Benfica, Standard Liège, Rangers, Lech Poznań
Group E: PSV Eindhoven, PAOK, Granada, Omonoia
Group F: Napoli, Real Sociedad, AZ Alkmaar, Rijeka
Group G: Braga, Leicester, AEK Athens, Zorya Luhansk
Group H: Celtic, Sparta Praha, AC Milan, LOSC Lille
Group I: Villarreal, Qarabağ, Maccabi Tel-Aviv, Sivasspor
Group J: Tottenham, Ludogorets, LASK, Royal Antwerp
Group K: CSKA Moskva, Dinamo Zagreb, Feyenoord, Wolfsberg
Group L: Gent, Crvena zvezda, Hoffenheim, Slovan Liberec

Villarreal will be racking-up plenty of frequent-flyer miles. Three trips to Asia! Bet that's never happened before. For those wondering, Sivasspor is based about 800km east of Istanbul.

Seems like Celtic and Milan draw each other a lot.

 

Cool graphic on travel distance for CL groups:

Also 538 has started their CL predictions now that draw is out, and to the extent you think they are decent (or at least consistent) at predicting you can see which teams and groups have the most certainty or uncertainty around advancing:

https://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/soccer-predictions/champions-league/

Not surprisingly, 16 teams are given a greater than 50% chance of advancing, but only 5 are given more 82% or better chance of advancing out of group stage. And at the margins of qualifying, the last 5 predicted to advance are at 58% Man U, 59% Leipzig, Atalanta, and Zenit, and 61% Inter. While the 5 below 50% of advancing are Porto 47%, Ajax 41%, Salzburg and Olympiaco 40%, and Lazio 38%.

 

Okay good news on this front. Barca hosts Ferencváros on Tues, Oct 20 and play in Turin on Wed, Oct 28 with el clasico on Sat Oct 24. So the matches nicely spread-out every 4 days. Can easily use our A team for all 3 (unless Pique already has 5 yellows which isn't beyond him --- j/k)

LPB host Donetsk on Wed, Oct 21 and are away to Borussia M on Tues Oct 27.

 

Atletico won’t beat Bayern. I don’t see their anti football prevail against a team that are ruthless attacking team which happens to be balanced side. A combination of positional play, counter attack and high press is too much for Simeone’s team to handle. In fact, they were pretty lucky against Liverpool and they didn’t even park the bus properly. Pep already exposed Simeone back in 2016 CL and only lost the tie due to Muller’s penalty miss. Also, we can win against Juventus considering Pirlo isn’t that experienced as a manager. Thank God, it isn’t Allegri and I expect this match to be pretty entertaining and high scoring.

 

Now that transfer windows are closed (for 10 weeks at least), and games are about to kick off in the group stage, here's a snap shot of what the 538 computer thinks, plus I list the top 16 or so teams the bookies fancy below this 538 snapshot in time (you can blow it up if hard to read):

https://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/soccer-predictions/champions-league/


Bookies favor the teams in this order:
Bayern 4:1 to win it all, implies 25% chance if there was no house cut
ManCity 4.5
Liverpool 7 (losing Virgil hurts)
PSG 10
Barca, Juve, & Real 14
Chelsea 22
Atleti 25
BVB 30
Inter & ManU 33
Atalanta 35
Sevilla 50
RB Leipzig 66
Lazio 100
Ajax & 'gladbach 125
Porto 200
Marseille & Zenit 300
Shaktar 400
Rennes, Salzburg, & Lokomotiv Moscow 500

Best longest odds to win it all from UK version of oddschecker which looks at multiple online bookies: https://www.oddschecker.com/football/champions-league/winner

 

Editing @unclesox post with %s from 538 https://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/soccer-predictions/champions-league/

Most likely to win or take 2nd are italicized

Here's a look at how things stand following Matchday 5.

Confirmed group winners
Confirmed group runners-up
Confirmed through to Round of 16
Still in contention to advance

Group A: Bayern Munich, Atlético Madrid 64% 2nd, RB Salzburg 36%
Group B: Borussia Mönchengladbach 42% win & 15% 2nd, Shakhtar Donetsk 15% win & 14% 2nd, Real Madrid 43% win & 24% 2nd, Internazionale 47% 2nd
Group C: Manchester City, FC Porto
Group D: Liverpool, Atalanta 49% 2nd, Ajax 51% 2nd
Group E: Chelsea, Sevilla
Group F: Borussia Dortmund 71% win 29% 2nd, Lazio 44% 2nd & 29% win, Brugge 27% 2nd
Group G: FC Barcelona 96% win, Juventus 96% 2nd
Group H: Paris Saint-Germain 84% win & 15% 2nd, Manchester United 46% 2nd & 9% win, RB Leipzig 7% win & 40% 2nd


If the italicized favorites all came true then Barca could draw Inter, Porto, Ajax, Lazio, or ManU. We could not draw Juve - own group, Sevilla or Atleti - Liga. We could not draw a top 10 team in round of 16 as 538 sees it. Sadly the round of 8 is where Barca stumbles these days.