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As we gear up for an additional version of the Girls’s Champions League, the joy round this iconic membership competitors is as tantalising as ever.
This season’s event, which begins on Tuesday, brings with it new managers and large strikes from some high gamers, as the perfect and brightest throughout girls’s European soccer go toe-to-toe.
Sixteen groups have certified and can now battle it out to be topped champions of Europe in Lisbon subsequent 12 months.
The event will welcome Celtic and Galatasaray, who’ve turn into the primary groups from Scotland and Turkiye, respectively, to succeed in the group stage on this present format.
There are additionally debutants within the type of Swedish facet Hammarby, who turned heads within the qualifying rounds by knocking out final season’s quarter-finalists Benfica.
After trailing within the first leg, Hammarby managed to say a historic victory. No crew had ever beforehand overturned a first-leg deficit in a Girls’s Champions League qualifier.
Barcelona are the reigning champions after they beat Lyon within the closing again in Could.
The expansion and power of the Girls’s Tremendous League has been mirrored on this 12 months’s closing 16. With Arsenal, Chelsea and Manchester Metropolis all qualifying, England at the moment are solely the third nation to have three groups attain the group stage of the competitors, with Germany and France having performed so beforehand.
Europe’s greatest are able to battle it out, however who’re the contenders, and which gamers might gentle up the 2024-25 version?
The principle contenders
Holders Barcelona may have a struggle on their fingers to retain their trophy this season, however additionally they have a robust likelihood of creating extra historical past themselves.
Barca are striving to turn into solely the second membership to win a 3rd consecutive Champions League, and they’ll additionally bid to equal Lyon’s file of showing in 5 straight finals, with the French facet having achieved the feat between 2016 and 2020.
Barca grew right into a dominant pressure beneath former boss Jonatan Giraldez, who’s now teaching Washington Spirit.
Former assistant coach to Giraldez, Pere Romeu, must see if he can proceed the membership’s quest for trophies, however the bar has been set excessive by that quadruple final season.
Groups will probably be on the lookout for the chink within the Catalans’ armour. Defensively, Barca had been typically wonderful final season, although they did have a slight defensive underperformance, conceding 1.6 targets greater than would have been anticipated primarily based on their anticipated targets in opposition to (xGA) figures within the Champions League, albeit when discounting personal targets, that underperformance dropped to 0.6.
In addition they had the meanest defence within the competitors when it got here to wash sheets, preserving six to assist them win 9 video games.
The most effective sides in entrance of purpose final season had been, unsurprisingly, the 2 groups that reached the ultimate – Barca and Lyon. They netted 36 instances every throughout 11 video games apiece.
Lyon, though beneath new management, are probably the most profitable facet within the historical past of the competitors, profitable eight titles, and they’re troublesome to look previous because the crew to beat.
Their free-shooting, free-flowing attacking system beneath former coach Sonia Bompastor noticed them produce a whopping 270 makes an attempt on purpose final time period, a median of 24.5 per sport. Barca (237) had been second for pictures, and shot conversion charge (15.19%), in the meantime.
Lyon’s xG was a tournament-leading 35.4, whereas Barca’s 29.11 ranked second – nevertheless, Barca enormously overperformed their xG.
Certainly, their 6.89 xG overperformance was the best constructive differential in final season’s competitors, proving their ending was of an exceptionally excessive commonplace.
It is not going to all be about Barca and Lyon, although. Two different former continental champions, Arsenal and Wolfsburg, are sides who will see themselves as able to dethrone Barca and style European glory as soon as extra.
Wolfsburg are six-time finalists and two-time champions, so they need to by no means be discounted. Nor ought to Bayern Munich, who’ve gained the Frauen-Bundesliga title within the final two seasons.
Bayern went out within the group stage final season, solely profitable considered one of their six video games, however they need to fare higher this time round.
And whereas they’re but to go all the best way in Europe, Chelsea and Manchester Metropolis may be forces to be reckoned with.
English trio to problem
Bompastor led Lyon to victory as their captain in 2011 and 2012 and as their head coach in 2021, an unbelievable feat that no one else has achieved within the event’s historical past.
She now finds herself in control of English Champions Chelsea and will probably be eager to guide her new facet to their first Champions League title.
Chelsea, who reached the semi-finals, had the perfect shot conversion charge (15.38%) within the 2023-24 event, scoring 20 targets from 130 pictures.
Bompastor will hope to construct on her personal success and information of the competitors and turn into the primary supervisor to guide an English facet to European success since Arsenal’s victory within the 2006-07 season.
Regardless of profitable the whole lot there may be to win domestically beneath earlier boss Emma Hayes, this can be a trophy that has evaded the Blues and they’re determined for fulfillment. They misplaced 4-0 in a humiliating closing outing versus Barcelona in 2020-21.
Serial winner Lucy Bronze has been introduced into the Chelsea fold by Bompastor, and an enormous think about that switch was her expertise of Champions League success. The formidable defender will intention to turn into solely the second participant, after Conny Pohlers, to win the competitors with three completely different sides, beforehand lifting the trophy with Lyon and Barcelona.
Metropolis, in the meantime, are showing within the group phases for the primary time because the competitors’s format was modified in 2021 and Gareth Taylor and his crew will probably be eager to point out Europe’s greatest why they’ve pushed Chelsea all the best way within the WSL in latest seasons.
Final season’s star gamers
Kadidiatou Diani was the main scorer in final season’s Champions League, netting eight targets, and he or she will probably be as harmful as ever in Lyon’s attacking line.
These targets got here from 4.77 xG — that 3.23 overperformance was larger than some other participant within the competitors. She was not solely the best goalscorer, however her finishes had been a stage above what would have been anticipated primarily based on the standard of probabilities she had.
Ada Hegerberg is the all-time main scorer within the competitors with 64 targets. Nonetheless, she underperformed her tournament-leading 7.33 xG by 2.33 final marketing campaign, so there’s scope for enchancment for the 29-year-old.
Regardless of the xG underperformance, she nonetheless tallied up a powerful 5 targets to complete tied for fifth within the charts, together with Caroline Hansen, Tabitha Chawinga, Marie-Yasmine Alidou and Sam Kerr.
Lyon’s Selma Bacha created probably the most probabilities in final season’s competitors (35), registering 4.12 anticipated assists (xA), although she solely supplied two assists in whole.
Barcelona’s Hansen (33) was second-highest for probabilities created, however led the best way for xA (4.66) and assists (5), stage together with her team-mate Aitana Bonmati and simply forward of Bronze and Roma playmaker Manuela Giugliano (each 4).
Between the sticks, St. Polten’s Carina Schluter was the busiest goalkeeper, making 43 saves, although Chelsea’s Zecira Musovic boasted the perfect save proportion (81.82%) of any shot-stopper to play no less than 90 minutes.
Jennifer Falk, of BK Hacken, was the best-performing goalkeeper when it got here to targets prevented, nevertheless, conceding 10, which is 3.85 fewer than would have been anticipated primarily based on the standard of pictures she confronted, in response to Opta’s anticipated targets heading in the right direction (xGoT) mannequin.
The teams
4 teams of 4 groups will battle it out to succeed in the knockout phases. There are some high ties to look ahead to earlier than we get to the final eight, and undoubtedly there will probably be some surprises alongside the best way.
Group A boasts two former champions with 10 titles between them in Lyon and Wolfsburg. The 2 sides have met in finals of the event on 4 events, with Lyon victorious in three of these situations.
However Wolfsburg, who thrashed Fiorentina in qualifying, have misplaced some large names over the summer season. Germany midfielder Lena Oberdorf, Poland ahead Ewa Pajor and Netherlands defender Dominique Janssen all exited forward of the brand new marketing campaign.
Pajor has made a improbable begin to life at Barcelona, scoring six targets already, and producing the best xG of any participant within the high 5 leagues to this point in 2024-25 (6.56).
Roma will be part of the 2 giants from Germany and France. Their greatest end within the event noticed them progress to the final eight on their competitors debut in 2022-23.
The group’s closing facet, Galatasaray, battled onerous by means of the qualifying rounds and stamped their mark on the competitors by knocking out three-time quarter-finalists Slavia to turn into the primary Turkish crew to succeed in the group stage.
Your Matchday 1 menu… #UWCL
— UEFA Girls’s Champions League (@UWCL) October 7, 2024
Group B has served up a well-recognized matchup with Chelsea and Actual Madrid being drawn collectively for a 3rd consecutive 12 months.
Dutch Champions Twente will convey an attacking model of soccer to the event and shouldn’t be underestimated. They scored 20 targets to qualify for the group phases. Debutants Celtic, in the meantime, will even look to make their mark.
Group C could possibly be thought-about the group of demise, with former champions Arsenal, Bayern and shock package deal Juventus, who brought on the largest upset of the qualifying rounds, going head-to-head.
The Bianconere grew to become the primary crew to knock out Paris Saint-Germain earlier than the quarter-finals since Tyreso in 2013-14, ending the goals of English primary Mary Earps after her huge transfer from Manchester United.
Group D will host probably the most thrilling fixture of the group phases as holders Barca tackle Man Metropolis within the opening sport. The groups have met beforehand in a quarter-final in 2020-21, with Barca occurring to win the event that 12 months.
St. Polten have certified for the fourth time in 5 seasons, and Hammarby have proven they aren’t petrified of the larger sides by knocking out considered one of final 12 months’s quarter-finalists Benfica within the qualifying rounds.
The event guarantees to be thrilling, with some intriguing storylines to observe from high to backside.
Will Barcelona win a 3rd straight crown, can Lyon lengthen their file variety of titles, or is it time for an English champion for the primary time since 2007? We are able to’t wait to seek out out.
