The Champions League draw takes place on Thursday evening, with Arsenal, Liverpool, Manchester City, Chelsea, Newcastle and Tottenham who all discover their competition phase opponents opponents
The Premier League is two games old and now the attention will focus on the Champions League, with the draw on Thursday.
There is a heavy English presence in the competition this season, with Arsenal, Liverpool, Manchester City, Chelsea, Newcastle and Tottenham among the 36 teams in the draw. It will be the second season of the new Champions League format, with four-team groups that have gone for a longer competition phase.
The draw takes place on Thursday 28 August at 5 pm BST after the conclusion of the last play-offs on Wednesday evening. Teams are placed in four pots based on UEFA's coefficient to determine their eight games at eight different sides, which will be played between September and January.
The rules of UEFA mean that the Premier League parties cannot face each other in the competition phase of the competition and each party can only play a maximum of two teams of a different association to maintain the variety. There are guaranteed some tasty luminaires, with each side agreements against two sides of each pot.
Here Mirror Football looks a look in the four pots and regards the dream and nightmare scenarios for the English clubs involved.
Pot 1
Real Madrid, Manchester City, Bayern Munich, Paris Saint-Germain, Liverpool, Inter Milan, Chelsea, Borussia Dortmund, Barcelona
Pot 2
Arsenal, Bayer Leverkusen, Atletico Madrid, Atalanta, Villarreal, Juventus, Eintracht Frankfurt, Benfica*, Club Brugge*
Pot 3
Tottenham, Ajax, PSV Eindhoven, Napoli, Sporting Lisbon, Olympiacos, Slavia Prague, Bodo/Glimt, Marseille
Pot 4
Monaco, Pafos, Galatasaray, Kairat Almaty, Union Saint-Gilloise, Athletic Club, Newcastle, Copenhagen*, Ferencvaros*
*Subject to move, with four other places still for the taking in the play-offs
Arsenal
The Gunners reached the semi -final last season after a strong show, but are in Pot 2, which are arranged in 15th place in the coefficient of UEFA.
The side of Mikel Arteta did well in the competition phase last season and finished third with six wins of their eight games, but hope to avoid PSG, who had their number in the semi -final and won both legs on the way to lifting the trophy. Inter was the only side that beat Arsenal in the competition phase, so they are another side to perhaps avoid pot 1.
Arsenal, on the other hand, had Real Madrid's song in the knockout phases last season and won both quarter-final legs. Arteta will want Dortmund, who looks the weakest side in pot 1. PSV are another team they want, with nine goals on two legs against the Dutch side last season.
Liverpool
The side of Arne Slot is fifth in the UEFA coefficient, so that they are placed in pot 1 with the Big-Hitters. They arrived the competition phase last season and won their opening of seven games around the table at the top despite losing the last game.
Liverpool was disappointed to be eliminated on a penalty shoot-out in the last 16 by PSG and will continue this time.
A match against Real Madrid would be full of story after the departure of Trent Alexander-Arnold and now the lead with Xabi Alonso. The Reds hit Alonso's Bayer Leverkusen 4-0 last season and have since signed their two best players, Florian Wirtz and Jeremie Frimpong, so it would be happy to face them. In reality there are no bogey sides for Liverpool outside of PSG, which will be one of the favorites.
Manchester City
City struggled in the Champions League en masse last season and finished 22nd in the competition phase with only three victories of their eight games. They were beaten by Sporting, Juventus and PSG and were held by Inter and Feyenoord before they were eliminated by Real Madrid.
Pep Guardiola's side will really avoid PSG in the draw, while Atletico Madrid seems to be the most difficult of the pot 2 options. They must expect that they have the pot 3 and pot 4 opponents in steam roller, given their team depth.
Chelsea
The blues are back in the long time after an absence of two seasons after winning the Conference League in style last season. The side of Enzo Maresca has been placed in pot 1, despite the 14th place in the UEFA coefficiërlistlist, which is a great start to the competition.
Chelsea showed that they can mix it with the best by beating PSG 3-0 in the club World Cup final in the summer, but they might prefer to play Dortmund and Inter from Pot 1.
With Kairat Almaty in the Champions League this year there will be a number of well -known conference competitions for them to make them feel at home.
Newcastle
The magpies arrive in a low 85th in the UEFA coefficient and are therefore in pot 4 and can be deleted for a number of challenging luminaires. But they have been here before and did well in the 2023/24 season, the highlight is a 4-1 victory over PSG.
But it was harder to go against Milan and Dortmund and after a difficult summer in the transfer window it will be a tough fight this time. The fans will enjoy a few big competitions, but Eddie Howe may want to avoid the German champions Bayern Munich and the Spanish Champions Barcelona.
Tottenham
Spurs are back in the Champions League thanks to their 1-0 win over Manchester United in the Europa League final. Thomas Frank was in the Premier League last season last season, and will have a job in Europe this season.
Back in the competition for the first time in two and a half seasons, they are currently planned to be in pot 3, so they are a number of difficult tasks. Real Madrid and Bayern Munich must be avoided, but the competition format gives them a considerable chance to qualify for the knockout phases.
MatchDay 1: 16-17 September, 2025
MatchDay 2: September 30 ,-1 October 2025
MatchDay 3: 21-22 October, 2025
MatchDay 4: 4-5 November 2025
MatchDay 5: 25-26 November, 2025
MatchDay 6: 9-10 December, 2025
MatchDay 7: 20-21 January, 2026
MatchDay 8: January 28, 2026