The UEFA official channel released a video that elaborately explains the draw rules and organizational format for this season’s Champions League, Europa League, and Europa Conference League, referred to as the “three major cups.” A UEFA official particularly emphasized that the so-called “downgrading” arrangement will be eliminated from this season’s European three major cups.
The draw model for the Champions League has been widely introduced. The draw rules for the Europa League and Europa Conference League are largely similar to those of the Champions League: participating teams are divided into four tiers for the draw, and opponents are drawn through a combination of human and computer methods (Champions League and Europa League participants play 8 matches against 4 opponents, 4 home and 4 away; Europa Conference League participants play 6 matches against 3 opponents, 3 home and 3 away). This so-called “first stage competition” replaces the original group stage. The teams ranked 1st to 8th in the end qualify for the round of 16, while teams ranked 9th to 24th compete in two-legged knockout matches for the remaining 8 spots in the round of 16. The first stage competition adheres to two principles of avoidance (teams from the same league will not meet in the first stage, and each team can face at most two teams from the same league in the first stage).
UEFA particularly emphasized that in this season’s European three major cups, downgrading will only occur during the qualifying stage (for example, teams eliminated from the Champions League qualifiers will be relegated to the Europa League qualifiers, etc.). However, this phenomenon will not appear during the main tournament stage. This is markedly different from previous years.
As is known, last season, the third-placed teams in each Champions League group were relegated to the Europa League; the third-placed teams in the Europa League groups were relegated to the Europa Conference League. Last season’s Europa Conference League champion, Olympiacos, was a team that had been relegated from the Europa League. In previous years, there were even exceptional cases like Sevilla: they often participated in the Champions League group stage, then after finishing third, competed in the Europa League and challenged for the championship, thus winning a Champions League spot and forming a cycle.
However, due to significant changes in the format of the Champions League and Europa League this season, once the main tournament stage begins, such downgrading will no longer exist. Teams participating in the main tournaments of the Champions League and Europa League will either advance or be eliminated, with no possibility of “downgrading participation.”