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Champions League Group Stage Field is Set

Find out who Atletico could play in the Champions League group phase.

Club Atletico de Madrid v FC Bayern Muenchen - UEFA Champions League Semi Final: First Leg Photo by Alexander Hassenstein/Bongarts/Getty Images

Here is a full list of the group stage participants for this season’s Champions League sorted by what pot they will be in for tomorrow’s draw, which will happen at 12pm eastern time in the United States.

Pot 1 Pot 2 Pot 3 Pot 4
Real Madrid Atletico Basel Monaco
Bayern Munich Dortmund Tottenham Dinamo Zagreb
Barcelona Arsenal Dynamo Kyiv Besiktas
Juventus Sevilla Lyon Celtic
PSG Porto Eindhoven Ludogorets
Leicester Manchester City Monchengladbach Legia Warsaw
Benfica Napoli Club Brugge Rostov
CSKA Moscow Bayer Leverkusen Sporting Copenhagen

Curious what the draw could look like for Atletico? Use this Champions League draw simulator tool to find out. I ran it three times. Here were my results:

Simulation 1

champions-league-simulation-draw-1

So that’s the defending German champions who we knocked off in last year’s semifinals, English club Tottenham Hotspur, and Turkish champions Besiktas. This is something of a nightmare as Bayern would be tough, Spurs are tricky, and a trip to Turkey sounds miserable.

Simulation 2

champions-league-group-stage-simulation-2

This draw is significantly kinder to us. We draw the weakest pot 1 side, Russian champions CSKA Moscow, as well as a weaker pot 3 side in Club Brugge of Belgium.

Simulation 3

champions-league-draw-simulation-3

This draw is also reasonably manageable. Bayern Munich is no fun, of course, but Sporting and Monaco are teams we should beat. The big question would be if we could top Bayern in the group and advance into the knockout rounds as a seeded team, thereby avoiding possible seeded teams such as Juventus, PSG, or Dortmund.