The Return of the Champions League

Tonight marks the return of the Champions League with Manchester United looking to emulate the European Cup back-to-back success of Nottingham Forest from the early 1980's and retain the trophy they won on a rainy night in Moscow back in May.

The current group format of the pre-Christmas Champions League games makes it very difficult to get excited about what still remains most prestigious trophy in club football. It won't be until the Spring when the knockout stage of the competition kicks in that world-wide TV audiences and match attendance figures will reach their respective peaks. Fans continue to vote with their feet and you can expect plenty of empty seats in Stamford Bridge tonight for the visit of Bordeaux. The additional European group matches with their ridiculous ticket prices continue to turn loyal fans away. It's bad enough having to pay increased prices for domestic league and cup matches so why fork out the extra hard earned quid for a meaningless group fixture against a side likely to feature in the latter stages of the UEFA Cup?

How long more can UEFA (or FIFA for that matter) persist with such an outdated competition structure - full of meaningless group games - that only serves to fill the coffers of the richest clubs through TV rights money? A revised structure could include two opening rounds of home and away fixtures. All the top teams would be seeded against the lowest ranked qualifiers with away goals coming into play. All the winners from the round two would then go into the hat for a straight knockout round 3 and so on all the way to the semi finals. Losers form the opening two rounds would play off for spots in the latter stages of the UEFA Cup. Can you imagine a third round pairing of Man Utd vs. Liverpool, Real Madrid vs. Barcelona or Arsenal vs. Juventus? This proposed structure would also allow for the likes of Athletico Madrid, Lyon or even Celtic to avoid the big boys until the latter stage of the competition (depending on the luck of the draw) and enjoy an extended run.

The G14 (or G3897) clubs would hardly agree to such a dangerous knockout structure on the off chance they would miss out on the extra TV money to be gained in the latter stages of the competition. How long before we have a European Super League with the richest clubs in Europe playing one another home and away in separate league. Sound far fetched? Well which would you rather watch this week: a meaningless group game between Chelsea vs. Bordeaux or a European Super League clash between Real Madrid vs. Liverpool?

The cries for bringing back the straight knock-out tournament structure are becoming louder with each passing season. The introduction of a play-off between the teams that finish 4th, 5th, 6th and 7th in the Premier League (a la the Play-Offs) to decide the final Champions League spot would also generate huge interest.

Now that really would bring in the punters…