Starting In 2024, The Champions League Will Use A New Format: No More Group Division
JAKARTA - The UEFA has agreed to approve a new format that will be used for their highest club competition, the Champions League. They announced the details of the changes on their official website on Tuesday night.
The most basic difference in the league that will start from the 2024/2025 season is the addition of four participants and the elimination of the group division format so that the Champions League will be followed by 36 teams in a single league.
In the new format, more commonly known as the Swiss Model, each participating team will play four more matches compared to the regular group stage format.
Each team no longer faced each other twice at home in the preliminary phase, but instead, compete 10 times against 10 different teams, half of which were played at home and the rest were away.
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Later, after each team plays 10 times, the top eight ranked teams will automatically qualify for the last 16, while the ninth to 24th ranked teams will enter the playoff round to determine the other eight top 16 teams.
While the team ranked 25th until the caretaker will be eliminated from European competition that season, there will be no further quota to the Europa League.
Starting from the round of 16, the competition format will still use the current knockout stage.
The UEFA stated that the single league format with similar rules above will also be applied regularly for the Europa League and the Conference League, Europe's third caste competition which is planned to start rolling in the 2021/2022 season.
The distribution of rations for new participants
The UEFA confirmed that the distribution of Champions League tickets in the new format will remain based on the achievements of clubs in their respective domestic leagues with a number of criteria.
The additional quota for the first participant will be given to the league/country that is ranked fifth in the UEFA coefficient standings.
The second share is given to the domestic league champions with the highest club coefficient score among local champions who do not get tickets to the Champions League finals.
The third and fourth rations are given to the two clubs with the highest coefficient value that failed to win a Champions League ticket but got a ticket to the Europa League or Conference League.