Barcelona may be Atalanta’s biggest fan in the Europa League final against Bayer Leverkusen, which is scheduled to be held in the Irish city of Dublin on May 22.
According to the newspaper “Marca”, Leverkusen winning the title will mean that the Catalan club will fall to second place in the Champions League draw next season.
Starting from the next edition of the Champions League, the 36 clubs will be divided into 4 pots according to the UEFA standard, instead of placing the champions of the major leagues, the defending champions and the European League champions in the first classification.
At the present moment, Barcelona has 91 points, in eighth and last place in the first classification of the UEFA points factor, which is based on European participation in the last 5 seasons.
Bayer Leverkusen raised its score from 88 to 90 points after its draw with Roma, and if it wins over Atalanta in the final, it will surpass Barcelona and go to the first classification, with the Blaugrana falling to the second classification.
Thus, it will not be in Barcelona’s interest for Xabi Alonso’s squad to win, on the one hand for marketing reasons related to the necessity of continuing in the first classification, and also for the sake of confrontations that may be relatively easier in the first round.
Each of the 36 clubs participating in the first round will play two matches against two teams from each of the four levels, with one home match and one away match.
It is noteworthy that the new Champions League system is one group that includes 36 clubs, with the first 8 in the standings qualifying for the round of 16, and from 9th place to 24th place in the playoffs, the other 8 teams will qualify for the round of 16.
