Expanded Champions League first stage to have 8 rounds from 2024
The Hindu
A scaled-back first phase to the expanded Champions League has been approved by UEFA to quell a backlash around Europe
A scaled-back first phase to the expanded Champions League in 2024 was approved by UEFA on Tuesday to quell a backlash around Europe.
The reformatted group stage has been reduced from 10 rounds to eight, and backup places for teams based on historical performance have been replaced with a qualification method that rewards the most successful nations more recently in European football.
The stage will still grow from 32 to 36 teams based around a single standings rather than eight groups.
Weeks of talks involving domestic leagues and clubs went down to the wire on Tuesday to produce the revised format that will see two additional places in the expanded format awarded to the two countries with the highest UEFA ranking based on their teams’ results in European competitions the previous season.
If the system was already in place, it would mean the fifth-place team in England would qualify for the Champions League along with a second automatic place for the Netherlands. The team finishing third in the Dutch league would get a chance to enter the qualifying rounds.
The original plan that sparked criticism, particularly among middle-class clubs and fans, would have awarded the two places to teams with the strongest five-season record in Europe who failed to qualify through their domestic leagues.
The distribution of the other two expansion places will see an additional team qualify from the fifth-ranked country in Europe—regularly France—and a fifth slot for domestic champions who don't qualify automatically.
Asian Games champion Avinash Sable opened his season in the 3000m steeple chase with a silver in the Portland Track Festival, a World Athletics Continental Tour bronze event, in Oregon on Saturday. He clocked 8:21.85s. Asian champion Parul Chaudhary took the bronze in the women’s 3000m steeple chase in a season-best 9:31.38s. Former Asian bronze medallist Sanjivani Jadhav struck gold in the women’s 10,000m in 32:22.77s, a time which was a second off her personal best, while Seema was sixth in 32:55.91s.