CHAMPIONS LEAGUE DRAW REACTION: 'PSG have a difficult schedule' - Gab Marcotti | ESPN FC

and head on over to our website right now if you wouldd like to know how the new Swiss format works with the Champions League draw it can be a bit of a mindfield if you're looking at it for the first time but don't worry Dale Johnson has you covered be more talk about that the draw was made today it's been revamped got more teams in it more games in the group stages as well and that's why gab's got that lovely backdrop right now because he was in Monaco today for the draw what's it out to you gab well uh like I mean we knew that being a top seed wasn't really going to be uh an advantage because of the way the way the Draw Works you play you know two teams from part one two from part two two from part three two from part four so in reality it comes down to what is your strength of schedule what are your opponents like um people have calculated this on paper Paris sgain certainly looks like look like they have you know a relatively tough schedule F I think statistically they have the toughest schedule of all um people can go and and they can draw their own conclusion what I'd be interested is if I were a Paris sgain fans hello Jules um I would look at this and say how many points do I need to get into the top eight because that's what matters that means that then I don't have to play those two playoff games in January and and I get seated and uh a lot of the analytics nerds who've looked at this and whatnot they estimate that 18 points um will should get you there uh maybe 16 or 17 so so you look at these eight games where are those 18 points coming from you know how are they going to get there um and equally I think for the for the worst teams most people estimates that it's going to be eight or nine points uh for them to qualify for the playoffs and I think that's how we should look at these schedules more interesting from the beginning more games that matter is that not something you could be on board for well the games didn't matter in the group stages well sometimes it would get to the end of the group stages it might not matter so much right figure out how this is going to work I mean I'm I'm happy to give it time and and and see how it goes but I mean I so it's going to be it's going to so teams are going to do exactly what they did in the grip stage but it is stage still depending on where they're sitting at the tie and they'll play whether they'll play the reserves or not which is what they did the in the last slot Stevie Stevie sorry if I jump in that's that's not quite right because the big difference is when you're in the group stage once you had the group one okay your man city You've Won your first four games and then in the last two you play you know you play Taylor Harvard Bellis and his dog and that's fine right uh and you probably still win because you're City and then you're at top seat and then you go into a draw the diff that was that's the old system there was no difference uh between the the group winners and how they got seated they didn't have any advantage um the difference now is that if you finish if you finish number one in the big table let's say you end up playing it gets seated kind of like Wimbledon right you have a higher seed so you avoid uh so like the number two and the number three team would be on the other half of the draw right if you see what I'm saying so the seating then matters because that continues all the way to the final once you get to the Knockouts um that's I think what they're hoping is going to be the incentive that yes of course if you lock up first place in the big ball early fine but when you're only playing eight games that's statistically very difficult to do so so the idea is people will compete to try to get the higher seeds because it gives you an advantage um going forward there are thousands of millions of people around the world that watch this competition we'll all be watching it well I'll be honest with you the same crappy games that were in the goup stages are not going to go away and they're not worth getting out of bed for most of them now maybe this new think will change it a little Liverpool take on Real Madrid also by 11 I said there's always those there's always games like that but don't just tell me about those games you know tell me about the crappy ones we just saw PSG they're going to get more money for there's more games so there's more Revenue so there's more money to share about blah blah blah right let's just see how it all pans out at the moment it's a mish mash and apart from gab and a few and a few a lot of people that have just read into this most mere mortals that just want to enjoy the game have not got a scoobydoo a Scooby how this is all going to work right it's just complexity over complexity and money Craig it is complex but there is a big difference about the big games you can say they've always been there but they haven't really always been there in the group stage because if you're a number one seed in the group stage if you're one of the top eight seeds uh in in the old system you're not playing another number one seed until you get into The Knockout rounds under this system every top seed is going to play two other top seated teams that's what they're counting for and that's why we're getting you know games like Liverpool Real Madrid and whatnot every number one seed is going to play every other number one seed twice and so you will have those big games now because they turn out to be crappy Neil nail draws sure that can always happen but that's football but at least on paper you are going to get these box office classes you're guaranteed them Frank have you been following along and what do you think of it all yes I've been following along and uh the all afternoon long I was trying to understand how it would work and uh I mainly understood you know how it works and well you know I want to give a a chance to the to the product as I always say and see how it works um it would be interesting in a way that yeah we have big big games could be a final of the champion U even just right now and that's that's a good thing um I have no doubt that will have some crappy game as Craig says and uh and it's hard to avoid them um and uh it is what it is um they want to make more money they found a way to make more money but they try to make it more attractive so let's give them a chance to prove us that uh it's more interesting this season that it was the past seasons and uh and we'll make a statement at the end of uh the first uh attempt all right well if you would like to know more about it cuz it sounds like you guys would like to know trust me no we're good there's not enough money in the world to make me read a long article on this oh well you don't need to read a long article because gab Ry Hanan and Mark Ogden have actually sat down and talked about it explained it in depth the perfect way for all of you at home and Craig Burley to go and watch over on our YouTube 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