Great Balls of Fire II

Time for the Champions League draw.

First, to all Swedes that are depressed over Malmö not qualifying: be careful what you wish for. Even though Malmö convinced at home, they were utterly thrashed away to a team that will be ranked as one of the worst in the group stage.  Imagine what would happen if Malmö got there. The squad is performing as a mid-table team in Sweden. I think we need a team that at least is the best in the country to represent us if we are ever to have a team in the Champions League again.

Example: Let's say Malmö would have qualified and would have been drawn against a mid-ranked team from all all seeding groups. That would mean a group consisting of, say, Bayern Munich, Benfica and Manchester City. Good luck.

Now Malmö will play in Europa League: the play offs are played tonight but let's say that if the big teams go through (and some of them are in serious trouble, an average group would consist of Sporting Lisbon, Celtic and Dinamo Bucharest. Tough, but possible. Swedbank Stadium will be similarly full, and Malmö will feel that they are there to move to the next level, not to act as a sand bag.

Now to the upcoming draw. I will not attempt to guess what UEFA will do to get the most exciting draw, but I note that my Milan had all reasons in the world to support Udinese last night. Not just because Serie A is slipping in the rankings, but also because Arsenal's qualification pushed Milan down to the group of second seeds.

Which means that Milan could face a group of Barca, Milan, Manchester City and Dortmund, for example. Best possible draw now would be Arsenal, Bate Borisov (what a night they had. Winning away to Sturm Graz and at the same time have UEFA declaring that Trabzonspor will replace Fenerhahce - pushing Bate Borisov up to the third seeds) and Otelul Galati.

Here are all the teams. Let's analyse more after the draw this afternoon.

Manchester Utd

Barcelona

Chelsea

Bayern

Arsenal

Real Madrid

Porto

Inter

Milan

Lyon

Shaktar

Valencia

Benfica

Villareal

CSKA Moscow

Marseille

Zenit

Ajax

Leverkusen

Olympiakos

Manchester City

Lille

Basel

Bate Borisov

Dortmund

Napoli

Dinamo Zagreb

Apoel

Trabz

Genk

Plzen

Otelul Galati