Here comes the draw!!!!

By: Iggy | August 26th, 2009

The Champions League draw is tonight (I’ll have another post after it), for those who don’t know (which included me until about 10 minutes ago) the pots are as follows:

Pot 1: Barcelona, Chelsea, Liverpool, Manchester United, Milan, Arsenal, Bayern Munich and Sevilla
Pot 2: Lyon, Inter, Real Madrid, CSKA Moscow, FC Porto, AZ, Juventus, and Rangers
Pot 3: Olympiacos, Marseille, Dynamo Kiev, Stuttgart, Fiorentina, Atlético Madrid, Bordeaux and Besiktas
Pot 4: Wolfsburg, Standard, Maccabi Haifa, Zurich, Rubin Kazan, Unirea Urzicini, APOEL and Debrecen

Strangeness of the pots aside, (Rangers ahead of Atletico!? really?) we could be in for a very interesting group phase. Inter, Juve, and Lyon are pretty scary in pot 2, and Atletico, Bordeaux and Olympiacos (Greeks at home are frightening) could all be interesting games from pot 3. I’m not familiar enough with the pot 4 teams to give an opinion on them.

Frankly I’d like to see a difficult group phase. I want to see our team go out and send a clear message that we won this trophy last year and we’ll be damned if we’re gonna go easy. I want to see a group of Barcelona, Inter, Bordeaux, and Wolfburg (picked Wolfburg at random).

There I said it. Who do you want to see?

Hasta la Victoria! Barça!!

Category: Barcelona, Champions League, Preview

Tags: Barcelona, Champions League, group, prediction, Preview

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• Hawk |  August 26th, 2009 at 10:54 pm

  
  
  

  Wolfsburg was Bundesliga champion last season so they are definitely toughest in pot 4.

  Posted from United States

  

• JC |  August 26th, 2009 at 11:00 pm

  
  
  

  wow i like that idea too…., spanish, italian french and german champions in one group. it’s quiet possible.

  Posted from United Arab Emirates

  

• yogesh |  August 27th, 2009 at 12:17 am

  
  
  

  I hope we get easy group. Things will anyways get tougher in knock out rounds so why suffer now.

  Posted from Netherlands

  

• ish |  August 27th, 2009 at 12:46 am

  
  
  

  you cant have teams from the same competition playing each other. Meaning that barce cant have real or a.madrid in their group.
  Hardest draw would be inter, bordeaux and wolfsburg.
  easiest would be rangers, besiktas, apoel.
  Barce wont have to face english teams though, which is lucky. In terms of travel the most annoying teams would be russia, ukraine and israel.

  Posted from United States

  

• Sid |  August 27th, 2009 at 2:15 am

  
  
  

  Dude. that logic doesnt make sense. In the early phase we need easy to medium phase for the team to gel. Also, we want to Focus on La Liga till Dec without much diversion too.

  Beats me, Why wud u want tough teams?

  Posted from United States

  

• Barcelona shirts |  August 27th, 2009 at 2:22 am

  
  
  

  I am hoping we can get an easy group to get through, it’s best to get warmed up first before having to take on the top teams but we shouldn’t have a problem with most of the teams in there

  Posted from United States

  

• Flippy |  August 27th, 2009 at 3:39 am

  
  
  

  Pot 4: Wolfsburg probably won’t be as good as they were last season, because they don’t have the same coach. I’d probably worry more about Rubin Kazan who took the RPL by storm last year and they are in Russia, which would be similar to us going to Ukraine to play Shaktar last year. Pot 3: Besiktas is in Turkey, Dynamo Kiev is in Ukraine, and Olympiacos is in Greece. Those away games are difficult, much more difficult than an away game in France, Italy, or Germany. Stuttgart is probably the easiest, especially if you look at their recent form and they would rule out any chance of getting Wolfsburg. Bordeaux is by far the best team in Pot 3.
  Pot 2: By Far the easiest teams are AZ and Porto. AZ have lost influential coach, van Gaal, and Porto have lost Lisandro Lopez as well as Quaresma last year. Rangers are shortly behind and Moscow is a long distance. Lyon would rule out Marseille and Bordeaux, but I’m feeling tired of them. Inter would see the return of Samu, but the team lacks creativity. Juventus is a tough team, especially on set pieces.
  What I would want would be something difficult, but not really difficult
  something like:
  Rangers, Bordeaux, and Wolfsburg.

  Posted from Spain

  

• Flippy |  August 27th, 2009 at 3:43 am

  
  
  

  Hopefully Madrid draw United, Florentina, and Rubin Kazan. Now that would awesome.

  Posted from Spain

  

• Mike814 |  August 27th, 2009 at 4:24 am

  
  
  

  I hope we can avoid a tough group so that we can still focus on la liga and copa del rey. A tough group may hurt our squad and the last thing we need is to finish 2nd in the group

  Posted from United States

  

• tanisha |  August 27th, 2009 at 4:42 am

  
  
  

  i dont think the draw matters really, im sure platini will figure out a way for barca to win again…

  Posted from United Kingdom

  

• Han |  August 27th, 2009 at 4:51 am

  
  
  

  I’ll second Mike814, but would like to see us battle Olympique Marseille, Rangers and Apoel.

  In pot 4:
  Wolfsburg (german champion + Edin Dzeko = tough)
  Standard (Belgian Champion + best belgian team since Anderlecht in 2001 = a possible surprise for alot of teams not us CL winners imo)
  Haifa (Isreali team + never really did something in Cl = dunno)
  Zurich (see above but swiss instead of isreali)
  Rubin Kazan (definately a team to miss = Russian Champions,in the middle of nowhere, dodgy team more concretely with alot of mysterious money and greedy but talented foreign players and russian machines)
  Unirea Urzicini (Romanian Champion + coached by Dan Petrescu former Chelsea player= unknown)
  Apoel (Cypriot champion = cannot be a problem but wait remember Anorthosis last year?)
  Debrecen (Hungarian Champion + traditionally 2nd or 3rd best team of country= lucky to be in CL will be out in no-time)

  Posted from United Kingdom

  

• Mike814 |  August 27th, 2009 at 8:37 am

  
  
  

  we got inter….i saw that coming…..i cant wait!!!

  Posted from United States

  

• mickey |  August 27th, 2009 at 8:59 am

  
  
  

  We cant wait either. This was a dream come true to play the european champions. And we will give that traitor ibra a royal welcome when he comes back to the san siro. Impossible is nothing!!!!!!!!!

  Posted from United States

  

• JC |  August 27th, 2009 at 9:18 am

  
  
  

  I hope we are in form when we play Inter. should be a good game. we will be against former team mates in Eto, Tiago Motta and Quaresma. Good early test for barca.

  Posted from United States

  

• mickey |  August 27th, 2009 at 9:24 am

  
  
  

  And a great test for us. Always an honor to host the European Champions. The atmosphere at the San Siro will be amazing. And how interesting that your fiercest rivals along with our fiercest rivals will be playing each other. Serie A’s former stars will be coming home!!!!!!

  Posted from United States

  

• Iggy |  August 27th, 2009 at 9:39 am

  
  
  

  San Siro here we come

  Posted from United States

  

• Vinod |  August 27th, 2009 at 11:26 am

  
  
  

  I’m not so sure we’d be ready to take you guys on come September. Without Cambiasso, I have this sick feeling in the pit of my stomach that your lot is going to run rings around us. Still, it’ll be a grand encounter, and the return game should be even more competitive.

  But really, to be honest, I’m more scared of Dinamo and Ruben Kazan, simply because we’ll have to go the coldest places in the world in November. Hopefully no one gets injured / frostbite.

  Posted from United States

  

• Zak |  August 27th, 2009 at 11:51 am

  
  
  

  What a crappy poll! All english teams got it easily. This sucks!

  Posted from United States

  

• French Football |  September 16th, 2009 at 9:53 am

  
  
  

  Very good post. Thanks for this.

  Posted from United States

  

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