Champions League Draw Fallout

The prestigious UEFA Champions League returns will full force on Tuesday 12th September,2017 across 16 venues in Europe. The defending champions,Real Madrid have been drawn in group H with Borussia Dortmund, Tottenham Hotspur and APOEL . The 12 time European champions became the first club to defend the UCL trophy in modern era after beating Juventus in the Cardiff final on June 3rd,2017.

Dortmund finished third in the Bundesliga while Tottenham failed to win their first league title by finishing second once again. Pochettino's side have been very poor in Europe and they might drop to the Europa league if they don't up their game this time around.

Manchester United have been placed in Group B where they will face Benfica, FC Basel and CSKA Moscow of Russia. The three time champions are currently sitting atop of the Premier League with 6 points and a goal difference of plus eight.

Gorup B
Bayern Munich will have their hands full when they tackle Paris Saint Germain, Anderlecht and Celtic. The German champions have won this competition on 5 occasions but they don't seem like one of the top favourites to win this year's title. PSG just signed Neymar Junior from FC Barcelona and with the array of stars like Cavani, Veratti, Angel Di Maria, Motta and others, they will definitely hope to go beyond the quarter final spot they got last season.

Group C
English champions, Chelsea will slug it out with Atletico Madrid, AS Roma and Qarabag. Antonio Conte's men lost their opening league match at the Stamford Bridge but they managed to edge Tottenham Hotspur by 2-1 at the Wembley stadium on Sunday. Perennial UCL finalists, Atletico Madrid will fancy their chance of finishing atop this group even though they will also be challenged by a decent Italian team. FC Qarabag of Azerbaijan are making their debut and it will take a miracle for them to even qualify for Europa league by finishing third in the group.

Group D
Juventus will face FC Barcelona, Olympiacos and Sporting Lisbon in a tough group. Last season's losing finalists will have to negotiate a tight pool that boasts of former champions, Barcelona and an enterprising Portuguese team. The Italians still have Gianlugi Buffon as their main keeper.

Group E
Liverpool FC will meet Sevilla, Sparta moscow and Maribor in a group that shouldn't pose much threat to the five time champions. The Reds defeated TSG Hoffeinheim by 6-3 on aggregate in order too reach this stage and their 2016 Europa League exploits that saw them finishing second will offer them the opportunity to seek for a revenge against Sevilla of Spain. Sparta Moscow won't be an easy opposition when you consider the distance between the Kremlin city and England.
Maribor should give the Red men six points.

Group F
Big spending Manchester City have been drawn with SS Napoli, Feyenoord and Shakhtar Donetsk of Ukraine. This obviously a very strong group as each of these teams is capable of picking a round of 16 ticket. My prediction is that Manchester City and Napoli will qualify.

Group G
AS Monaco ended PSG's reign of being the champions of France last season, but they will have to overcome the likes of FC Porto, Besiktas and RB Leipzig of Germany. Just like group F, this pool also looks balanced and any of these teams can qualify. Based on the quality of the players, I think Monaco and Porto will go through.

Till next post.............enjoy soccer