Champions League last 16: the contenders reviewed and rankedAnd email jacob.steinberg@theguardian.com or tweet @JacobSteinberg 10.25am GMT Paul’s right, this person definitely has too much time on their hands.Whoever made this Champions League draw odds-ometer has way too much time on their hands. It is impressive though: pic.twitter.com/rhOtbx7uyQ 10.24am GMT I’m ploughing through previous draws. In 2005-06, one second-placed team went through, Benfica knocking out Rafa Benitez’s Liverpool, who were the defending champions. In 2004-05, three teams went through (one was Liverpool; we know what happened next). Two went through in 2003-04, one of them Jose Mourinho’s Porto. Then we get to 2002-03 and a time when Uefa thought it was a good idea to have two group stages. Blimey, what a time that was. What were they thinking? 10.16am GMT So what hope do you have if you’re a second-placed team? Here are some thoughts from me on the Champions League blog the other day:Is there hope for the second-placed teams?Congratulations are in order to all the teams who have qualified for the knockout stages but the celebrations of the ones who finished second may be cut short if any of them are masochistic enough to recall the brutal nature of last season’s round of 16, when eight mostly drama-free ties made a mockery of the idea of the Champions League as a tournament that permits the underdog to have its day. To recap, the aggregate score was 38-13 in favour of the group winners and the only contest that resembled a fair fight was when Olympiakos went toe-to-toe with Manchester United, which may have had something to do with the identity of the English side’s manager. Even then, despite losing the first leg 2-0 in Greece, United still progressed thanks to Robin van Persie’s hat-trick at Old Trafford, briefly giving David Moyes some welcome respite.Galatasaray also held Chelsea to a 1-1 draw in Turkey before losing a tepid second leg 2-0 at Stamford Bridge but otherwise each tie was effectively over as a spectacle after the first legs, as the first-placed sides twisted the knife in ruthless fashion. The most one-sided matches saw Real Madrid win 6-1 at Schalke,Borussia Dortmund win 4-2 at Zenit St Petersburg and Paris Saint-Germain thump Bayer Leverkusen 4-0 in Germany, while the limitations of Arsenal and Manchester City were exposed in respective 2-0 defeats by Bayern Munich andBarcelona, both of whom took advantage of their opponents having men sent off. At least Milan had some hope after only losing 1-0 to Atlético Madrid at San Siro – until the second leg 4-1 in Spain, that is. 10.04am GMT First they have the FA Cup draw on a Monday and now it’s the Champions League draw too. Honestly, what is the world coming to? There are some serious questions to answer but I suppose we can leave them for the time being; this is, after all, one of the biggest days in Gianni Infantino’s year, essentially the reason he gets up in the morning, and we wouldn’t want to ruin it. You work that stage, Gianni! You get them to shake those balls! This is your time! But it can’t all be about Gianni. It’s about the teams in the draw too. Here are the group winners: Atletico Madrid, Barcelona, Bayern Munich, Borussia Dortmund, Chelsea, Monaco, Porto, Real Madrid. And here are the second-placed teams: Arsenal, Basel, Bayer Leverkusen, Juventus, Manchester City, PSG, Schalke, Shakhtar Donetsk. Continue reading...
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