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Revision as of 16:39, 17 April 2007
 | This article does not cite any sources. Please help improve this article by adding citations to reliable sources. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. Find sources: "UEFA Champions League" – news · newspapers · books · scholar · JSTOR (April 2007) (Learn how and when to remove this message) |
Current season, competition or edition: UEFA Champions League 2006-07 | |
| File:UEFA Champions League logo 2.svg | |
| Sport | Football |
|---|---|
| Founded | 1955 |
| No. of teams | 32 (Group stage) |
| Country | UEFA member associations |
| Most recent champion(s) |  F.C. Barcelona |
The UEFA Champions League (formerly named but still often called the European Cup) is a seasonal club football competition organized by the Union of European Football Associations (UEFA) for the most successful football clubs in Europe. The prize, the European Champion Clubs' Cup, is considered the most prestigious club trophy in the sport.
The tournament was inaugurated in 1955, at the suggestion of the French sports journalist and L'Équipe editor Gabriel Hanot, as a continental competition for winners of the European national football leagues, under the name of European Cup. In the 1992–93 season, the tournament was renamed to UEFA Champions League and, since then, the competing teams have been the top performing domestic teams of Europe, even though some teams have never been league champions in their respective countries. The UEFA Champions League is not to be confused with the UEFA Cup, the secondary championship for European club teams, nor with the now defunct Cup Winners' Cup. The winner of the tournament qualified for the also defunct Intercontinental Cup (against the winner of the Copa Libertadores of South America), played yearly between 1960 and 2004.
The tournament consists of several stages and begins with three preliminary knockout qualifying rounds. Different teams start in different rounds, according to their position in domestic league and the UEFA coefficients of their league, while the sixteen top ranked teams spread across the biggest domestic leagues qualify directly.
In the subsequent preliminary round, participating teams are paired, with aggregate winners proceeding into the next round. Qualifying rounds span from mid-July to late August. The losers of the third qualifying round are transferred to the UEFA Cup, while the sixteen winners of the final qualifying round are joined by the sixteen teams who have qualified directly, to participate in the group stage.
Teams are drawn into eight groups of four teams, each team playing every other team in the group twice (home and away). The group stage is played between mid-September and early December. The teams finishing third in their groups are transferred to the UEFA Cup, while the top two teams from every group qualify for the next round. Here the sixteen remaining teams take part in the knock-out stage, which starts in late February and ends with the final match in May.
All qualifying rounds and knock-out ties are two-legged, with each team hosting one match. The team which scores the greater aggregate number of goals qualifies for the next round. The away goals rule applies. Extra time and penalty kicks are used to determine the winner, if necessary. An exception is the final, which is a single match played at a predetermined venue.
The draws are currently structured to ensure that clubs representing the same national association cannot play each other until the quarter-finals. In addition, seeding of the teams according to their UEFA coefficients is used. The competition system has been undergoing changes since the 1991/92 season (see history). The current system was adopted in 2003.
The current holder of the UEFA Champions League trophy is F.C. Barcelona, who beat Arsenal F.C. 2-1 at the Stade de France, in St-Denis, Paris, on 17 May 2006. Barça, however will not be able to retain the title after being defeated in the first knock-out stage by Liverpool F.C., the 2005 champions.
The final of the 2006–07 season will be played at the Olympic Stadium, Athens, Greece, on 23 May 2007.
Qualification
The UEFA Champions league is open to the league champions of all UEFA member associations (except Liechtenstein, which has no league competition), as well as to the clubs finishing from second to fourth position in the strongest leagues. Since January 2007 the two lowest-ranked league competitions (currently the Andorra and San Marino leagues) can also represent their domestic champions in the Champions League.
The number of places in the competition depends on the association's rank in the UEFA coefficients table:
- associations ranked 1 to 3 have four positions,
- associations ranked 4 to 6 have three positions,
- associations ranked 7 to 15 have two positions,
- associations ranked 16 or lower have one position.
An association's rank also determines the stage at which the clubs enter the competition. For example, the three highest-ranked associations have two places in the group stage (for champions and runners-up) and two in the third qualifying round (for third and fourth-placed teams), whereas the lowest-ranked associations have only one place in the first qualifying round for their champions. Nine highest-ranked associations have at least one automatic place in the group stage.
An additional place in the group stage is reserved for the title-holders, in case they don't qualify via their domestic league. However, an association is limited to sending at most four clubs for a season. This means that if the title-holders come from a league given four positions, but finish out of the top four, it will take the place of the fourth placed team. The fourth placed team will go to the UEFA Cup.
In addition to sporting criteria, any club must be licensed by its national association to participate in the Champions league. To obtain a license, club must meet certain stadium, infrastructure and finance requirements.
There was controversy when Liverpool won the competition in 2004/2005, but finished outside the top four in the Premiership. The Football Association ruled that Everton F.C. (who finished fourth) would get the final spot. However, UEFA came to an agreement that both Merseyside rivals would be allowed to enter the competition with Liverpool starting from the first qualifying round and Everton starting from the third qualifying round. Liverpool became the first team to negotiate all three rounds of qualification and reach the Champions League group phase, a feat matched by Artmedia Bratislava of Slovakia in the same season. Liverpool went on to become the first team to reach the knockout phase from the first qualifying round.
FC Barcelona, Manchester United and FC Porto are the teams that have appeared most often in the group stages: twelve each. However, each has won the Champions League only once since the group stage was established.
Champions League finals
Main article: European Cup and Champions League finalsThe Champions League final is the most important match of the season in European club football. The stadium to host the final is selected by UEFA two years before the match.
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The latest UEFA Champions League final was held in Paris at the Stade de France on 17 May 2006 between Arsenal and Barcelona, which Barcelona won 2-1. In this particular match, Arsenal goalkeeper Jens Lehmann was sent off and despite a header by Sol Campbell, two late goals by Samuel Eto'o and Juliano Belletti (both assisted by Henrik Larsson) secured victory for the Spanish side who had previously been trailing 1-0 to the Gunners for the majority of the match.
- The 2006-07 season final will take place at the Spiros Louis Olympic Stadium, Athens.
- The 2007-08 season final will take place at the Luzhniki Stadium, Moscow.
- The 2008-09 season final will take place at the Stadio Olimpico, Rome.
Real Madrid have won this competition nine times. The next most successful teams are A.C. Milan (six titles), Liverpool F.C. (five titles), FC Bayern Munich and Ajax Amsterdam (four titles). For complete list of the winners, see European Cup and Champions League finals or European Cup and Champions League statistics.
The winning club gets possession of the trophy at the awards ceremony, but must return it to UEFA headquarters two months before the following year's final. UEFA gives the winners a scaled-down replica of the trophy to keep permanently, and winning clubs are free to make replicas of the trophy as long as they are clearly marked as replicas and are no larger than 80% of the size of the actual trophy. However, the current competition rules also specify that the actual trophy will be permanently awarded to a team that wins three consecutive years or five times in all.
Five clubs have been awarded the UEFA badge of honour and the right to keep the trophy permanently:
- Real Madrid, who won the first five competitions from 1956 to 1960,
- Ajax Amsterdam, who won consecutively in 1971–1973,
- Bayern Munich, who won consecutively in 1974–1976,
- A.C. Milan, who won for the fifth time in 1994,
- Liverpool, whose 2005 win was their fifth overall.
The first European Cup/UEFA Champions League final to be competed between two clubs from the same country was in 2000, when Spanish giants Real Madrid and Valencia reached the final. This was followed in 2003 when Italian giants AC Milan and Juventus reached the final, making it only two intra-national finals since its inception in 1955. However as of the 2007 Semi-Finals Chelsea FC, Liverpool FC and Manchester United FC are all in contention, making an all-English final possible.
History
Main article: European Cup and Champions League historyOriginally known as the European Champion Clubs' Cup, or simply abbreviated to European Cup, the competition began in 1955/56 using a two-leg knockout format where the teams would play two matches, one at home and one away, and the team with the highest overall score qualifying for the next round of the competition. Entry was restricted to the teams that won their national league championships, plus the current European Cup holder. This qualification system continued until 1997. From the 1997/98 season, the rules were changed to provide the cup with more exposure (and the extra sponsorship money that came with it), and to try to make it more "exciting". Teams other than national champions were allowed to compete, based on the relative strength of the football in that nation - from UEFA's point of view, a team finishing second in the Spanish La Liga would be more deserving of an automatic place in the Champions League than a team finishing first in, for example, Polish Orange Ekstraklasa. As a result, the system was restructured to force "weaker" national champions to qualify for the group stages, while other, "stronger" national runners-up would automatically get places.
Records and statistics
By Nation
By Club
(When sorted by years won or lost, the table is sorted by the date of each teams first win)
Hymn
The UEFA Champions League Anthem, officially titled simply as "Champions League", is an arrangement by Tony Britten of Georg Frideric Handel's "Zadok the Priest" from the Coronation Anthems. UEFA commissioned Britten in 1992 to arrange their hymn, who took the beginning of "Zadok the Priest" as a starting point for his arrangement. The piece was performed by the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra and sung by the Academy of St. Martin in the Fields chorus in the three official languages used by UEFA: English, German, and French. The hymn's chorus is played before each UEFA Champions League game, as well as at the beginning and end of television broadcasts of the matches. The complete hymn is about three minutes long, and has two short verses and the chorus. The hymn has never been released commercially in its original version. However, the Academy of St. Martin in the Fields chorus can be heard singing the original "Zadok the Priest" on the 2002 album "World Soccer Anthems". Additionally, Polish trance/dance duo Kalwi & Remi released a remixed version entitled "Victory", which contains vocal and musical interpolations from the original, in late 2006.
Financial
UEFA Champions League is a highly profitable competition for the clubs that reach the group stage. UEFA distributes part of the revenue obtained from television deals between these clubs. For example, the payments for the 2004/05 competition ranged from €3.8m (Sparta Prague) to €30.6 million (Liverpool). UEFA estimates the amount of money to be given to the 32 participants of the 2005/06 group stage at €430 million. Clubs make additional money from ticket sales, corporate hospitality, merchandising and so on.
See also
- European Cup and Champions League history
- European Cup and Champions League finals for a table of all winners and runners-up
- List of UEFA Champions League winning players for a table of all winning players
- European Cup and Champions League statistics for further detail
- European Super Cup
- UEFA Cup
- UEFA Cup Winners' Cup
- UEFA Intertoto Cup
- UEFA Club Football Awards
- UEFA Team of the Year
- European football records
- G-14
- UEFA Champions League 2006/2007 Games
References
- Matthew Spiro (2006-05-12). "Hats off to Hanot". UEFA.com. Retrieved 2006-07-10.
- "Man City stadium given Uefa final". BBC. Retrieved 2006-09-04.
- "Regulations for the UEFA Champions League 2006/07" (PDF). UEFA. Retrieved 2006-07-10.
- Monaco's stadium is actually in the city of Fontvieille in the micro-state of Monaco, and is only listed as French because Monaco does not have its own league.
- "UEFA CHAMPIONS LEAGUE - DISTRIBUTION 2002/2003" (PDF). UEFA. Retrieved 2006-07-10.
- "Higher Champions League revenue". UEFA.com. 2005-09-26. Retrieved 2006-07-10.
External links
- UEFA Official Site
- Lyrics and audio file of the UEFA Champions League Music
- RSSSF European Cups Archive
- UEFA European Cup Football - independent site with regularly updated statistics including club and country rankings, tournament seedings, and match results.
- Moscow2008.org - Luzhniki stadium
- Rome2009.net - Olimpico stadium
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| International men's club football competitions | ||
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| Asia | ||
| Europe | ||
| North, Central America and the Caribbean | ||
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| See also: International women's club football | ||