2018–19 UEFA Champions League group stage

The 2018–19 UEFA Champions League group stage began on 18 September and ended on 12 December 2018.[1] A total of 32 teams competed in the group stage to decide the 16 places in the knockout phase of the 2018–19 UEFA Champions League.[2]

Draw

The draw for the group stage was held on 30 August 2018, 18:00 CEST, at the Grimaldi Forum in Monaco.[3]

The 32 teams were drawn into eight groups of four, with the restriction that teams from the same association could not be drawn against each other. For the draw, the teams were seeded into four pots based on the following principles (Regulations Article 13.06):[2]

Pot 1 contained the Champions League title holders, the Europa League title holders, and the champions of the top six associations based on their 2017 UEFA country coefficients.[4] If either the Champions League or Europa League title holders were one of the champions of the top six associations, the champions of the association ranked seventh (and possibly eighth) were also seeded into Pot 1.
Pot 2, 3 and 4 contained the remaining teams, seeded based on their 2018 UEFA club coefficients.[5]

On 17 July 2014, the UEFA emergency panel ruled that Ukrainian and Russian clubs would not be drawn against each other "until further notice" due to the political unrest between the countries.[6]

Moreover, the draw was controlled for teams from the same association in order to split the teams evenly into the two sets of four groups (A–D, E–H) for maximum television coverage. On each matchday, one set of four groups played their matches on Tuesday, while the other set of four groups played their matches on Wednesday, with the two sets of groups alternating between each matchday. The following pairings were announced by UEFA after the group stage teams were confirmed:[3][7]

Spain: Real Madrid and Barcelona, Atlético Madrid and Valencia
Germany: Bayern Munich and Borussia Dortmund, Schalke 04 and 1899 Hoffenheim
England: Manchester City and Tottenham Hotspur, Manchester United and Liverpool
Italy: Juventus and Inter Milan, Napoli and Roma
France: Paris Saint-Germain and Lyon
Russia: Lokomotiv Moscow and CSKA Moscow
Portugal: Porto and Benfica
Netherlands: PSV Eindhoven and Ajax

The fixtures were decided after the draw, using a computer draw not shown to public, with the following match sequence (Regulations Article 16.02):[2]

Note: Positions for scheduling do not use the seeding pots, e.g. Team 1 is not necessarily the team from Pot 1 in the draw.

Group stage schedule
Matchday	Dates	Matches
Matchday 1	18–19 September 2018	2 v 3, 4 v 1
Matchday 2	2–3 October 2018	1 v 2, 3 v 4
Matchday 3	23–24 October 2018	3 v 1, 2 v 4
Matchday 4	6–7 November 2018	1 v 3, 4 v 2
Matchday 5	27–28 November 2018	3 v 2, 1 v 4
Matchday 6	11–12 December 2018	2 v 1, 4 v 3

There were scheduling restrictions: for example, teams from the same city (e.g. Real Madrid and Atlético Madrid) in general were not scheduled to play at home on the same matchday (to avoid them playing at home on the same day or on consecutive days, due to logistics and crowd control), and teams from "winter countries" (e.g. Russia) were not scheduled to play at home on the last matchday (due to cold weather).

Teams

Below are the participating teams (with their 2018 UEFA club coefficients),[5] grouped by their seeding pot. They include:

26 teams which enter in this stage
6 winners of the play-off round (4 from Champions Path, 2 from League Path)

Key to colours
Group winners and runners-up advance to round of 16
Third-placed teams enter Europa League round of 32

Pot 1 (by association rank)[4]
Assoc.	Team	Coeff.[5]
TH	Real Madrid	162.000
EL	Atlético Madrid	140.000
1	Barcelona	132.000
2	Bayern Munich	135.000
3	Manchester City	100.000
4	Juventus	126.000
5	Paris Saint-Germain	109.000
6	Lokomotiv Moscow	22.500

Pot 2
Team	Notes	Coeff.[5]
Borussia Dortmund		89.000
Porto		86.000
Manchester United		82.000
Shakhtar Donetsk		81.000
Benfica	^[LP]	80.000
Napoli		78.000
Tottenham Hotspur		67.000
Roma		64.000

Pot 3
Team	Notes	Coeff.[5]
Liverpool		62.000
Schalke 04		62.000
Lyon		59.500
Monaco		57.000
Ajax	^[LP]	53.500
CSKA Moscow		45.000
PSV Eindhoven	^[CP]	36.000
Valencia		36.000

Pot 4
Team	Notes	Coeff.[5]
Viktoria Plzeň		33.000
Club Brugge		29.500
Galatasaray		29.500
Young Boys	^[CP]	20.500
Inter Milan		16.000
1899 Hoffenheim		14.285
Red Star Belgrade	^[CP]	10.750
AEK Athens	^[CP]	10.000

Notes

^TH Champions League title holders, automatically placed into Pot 1 as top seed.
^EL Europa League title holders, automatically placed into Pot 1 as second top seed.
^CP Winners of play-off round (Champions Path).
^LP Winners of play-off round (League Path).

Format

In each group, teams played against each other home-and-away in a round-robin format. The group winners and runners-up advanced to the round of 16, while the third-placed teams entered the Europa League round of 32.

Tiebreakers

Teams were ranked according to points (3 points for a win, 1 point for a draw, 0 points for a loss), and if tied on points, the following tiebreaking criteria were applied, in the order given, to determine the rankings (Regulations Articles 17.01):[2]

Points in head-to-head matches among tied teams;
Goal difference in head-to-head matches among tied teams;
Goals scored in head-to-head matches among tied teams;
Away goals scored in head-to-head matches among tied teams;
If more than two teams were tied, and after applying all head-to-head criteria above, a subset of teams were still tied, all head-to-head criteria above was reapplied exclusively to this subset of teams;
Goal difference in all group matches;
Goals scored in all group matches;
Away goals scored in all group matches;
Wins in all group matches;
Away wins in all group matches;
Disciplinary points (red card = 3 points, yellow card = 1 point, expulsion for two yellow cards in one match = 3 points);
UEFA club coefficient.

Groups

The matchdays were 18–19 September, 2–3 October, 23–24 October, 6–7 November, 27–28 November, and 11–12 December 2018.[1] The scheduled kickoff times were 21:00 CET/CEST, with two matches on each Tuesday and Wednesday scheduled for 18:55 CET/CEST.[8]

Times are CET/CEST,[note 1] as listed by UEFA (local times, if different, are in parentheses).

Group A

Pos	Team	Pld	W	D	L	GF	GA	GD	Pts	Qualification	DOR	ATM	BRU	MON
1	Borussia Dortmund	6	4	1	1	10	2	+8	13[lower-alpha 1]	Advance to knockout phase	—	4–0	0–0	3–0
2	Atlético Madrid	6	4	1	1	9	6	+3	13[lower-alpha 1]	Advance to knockout phase	2–0	—	3–1	2–0
3	Club Brugge	6	1	3	2	6	5	+1	6	Transfer to Europa League	0–1	0–0	—	1–1
4	Monaco	6	0	1	5	2	14	−12	1		0–2	1–2	0–4	—

Source: UEFA
Rules for classification: Group stage tiebreakers
Notes:

Head-to-head goal difference: Borussia Dortmund +2, Atlético Madrid –2.

18 September 2018

21:00

Club Brugge	0–1	Borussia Dortmund
	Report	Pulisic 85'

Jan Breydel Stadium, Bruges

Attendance: 25,181[9]

Referee: Danny Makkelie (Netherlands)

18 September 2018