The next edition of the UEFA Women’s Champions League will debut new format, anthem, logo and, on a happy note for us, a brand-new participant as AC Milan Women mathematically secured their spot after a goalless draw against Sassuolo in the last game. Thus, for all the milanisti who have joined the fray this season, we, at Milan Reports, will break the new UWCL down, from top to bottom.
Let’s get started with the simple, and beautiful things.
New brand indentity
Last Monday (May, 17, 2021) UEFA unveiled the new anthem and logo for the Women’s Champions League. As the competition will adopt a new format, it seemed appropriated to update it’s brand identity to be more inclusive, progressive and recognizable on it’s own. UEFA’s chief of women’s football, Nadine Kessler, said:
The UEFA Women’s Champions League is a competition on its own, with its own sporting and commercial set-up, with its own uniqueness. So why shouldn’t we have a separate anthem and brand attached to this competition? People need to know the UEFA Women’s Champions League, they need to have something they can relate to and be attached to and I believe such an anthem is really important for a recognizable competition.
So, without further due, here is the new competition anthem, which is sung in UEFA’s three official languages – English, French and German, one that all Milan fans all hope the hear at San Siro:
New format, more games
In order to increase the number of games and make the competition more appealing for both sponsors and broadcasters, the UEFA will introduce, for the first time, a group stage, when the competition’s sponsorship and media rights will be centralized. For the fans, things got a little more complicated to understand, but Milan Reports got your back.
For starters, there will be 73 participants on the competition, an increase regarding the last edition, where 62 teams took part of it. Now, here comes the first big change. Instead of two qualifying rounds followed by a Round of 32 and a Round of 16, the road to the group stage is split in two new stages (called Champions Path and League Path) and then, whoever qualifies will reach the group stage, with four groups of four teams.
Note that the titleholders (Barcelona) and League champions from the three best ranked national association (France, Germany and Spain) have their spot on the group stage secured, however, according to article 3.04 of UEFA regulations, as Barcelona is both titleholder and Spain’s domestic champions, their spot on the group stage goes for domestic champions of the fourth best ranked national association (England). As for now, that would be PSG, Bayern and Chelsea.
What is the “Champions Path”?
The Champions path is split in three rounds. On the first round, the domestic champions of national associations ranked from 49 to 52 face each other and the 2 winners join the domestic champions of national associations ranked 8 to 48 (including Juventus) on mini tournaments with 4 participants, semifinals, final and third-place match. From those 44 teams, 11 will qualify and join the champions from national associations 4 to 6 (England, Sweden and Czech Republic, plus Denmark due to article 3.04) on the round 2, consisted on two-legged games, after that, and 7 Champions path’s winner will progress to the Group Stage.
For us, milanisti, this is not much of concern because, as runners-up in Serie A, the rossonere qualified for round 2 of the League Path.
What is the “League Path”?
The League path is split in two rounds. The first round gathers the third places from national association ranked 1 to 6 (France, Germany, Spain, England, Sweden and Czech Republic) and the runners-up from national association ranked from 7 to 16 (Denmark, Netherlands, ITALY, Kazakhstan, Norway, Iceland, Switzerland, Scotland, Russia and Belarus) and they will be drawn into four one-venue knock-out mini-tournaments, with one-off semi-finals, a third-place match and a final. Only 4 of those teams get into the round 2 of League Path.
According to the UEFA regulations (article 22.01), the venue to round 1 of the League Path might be chosen by an agreement among the clubs or designated by UEFA through voting among the clubs, priority given from associations who do not already have clubs hosting a round 1 mini-tournament or a draw.
Now, pay attention that we’re talking about Milan. As for now, those 16 teams are Bordeaux, Hoffenheim, Levante, Arsenal, Häcken, Slovácko, Fortuna Hjørring, Ajax, AC Milan, Tomiris Turan, Rosenborg, Valur, Rangers, FC Zürich Frauen, Lokomotiv and FC Minsk.
Those 4 teams qualified are joined by runners-up from national association ranked 1 to 6 (France, Germany, Spain, England, Sweden and Czech Republic) and, after the ties are drawn, they will compete on a two-legged showdown (home and away) and 5 League path team winners progress to the group stage.
What is the “Milan Path”?
Long story short, AC Milan, as said before, qualified to round 1 of the League Path, alongside other 15 teams, including the likes Arsenal, Levante (or even Real Madrid, as they are close in the standings), Valur and Bordeaux. They will be drawn (on June, 21) into 4 groups of 4, much like the Supercoppa Italiana format this season, and only the winners qualify for round 2. The semi-finals will take place on August 18 and the Final and third place play-off on August 21.
If the rossonere want their Champions League experience to be more than a single game, and more important, if they want to play at San Siro, they must win this one-venue knock-out mini-tournaments and reach Round 2 whatever it takes.
