Real Madrid, AC Milan will face battle to advance out of Champions League group play
Defending champion Inter Milan and former champions Barcelona and Manchester United were handed relatively safe passages through the first round of the European Champions League when the draw was held Thursday in Monaco.
The same was not true for nine-time winner Real Madrid, seven-time winner AC Milan and four-time winner Ajax Amsterdam. The three powers were drawn into the same formidable group, along with luckless Auxerre.
For Inter Milan, now coached by former Liverpool boss Rafael Benitez, the prospect of facing Werder Bremen, Tottenham Hotspur and Twente Enschede in Group A play will not be especially daunting, despite team President Massimo Moratti’s words of caution.
“It’s a difficult group, extremely balanced,” Moratti told UEFA.com. “We cannot relax in this group and certainly can’t consider it easy.”
Manchester United Coach Alex Ferguson should have no qualms about Group C, which also includes Valencia, Rangers and Bursaspor.
“It’s a good draw for us,” Ferguson said. “You always look at the traveling side of it and the only one that’s of any great distance is the trip to Turkey” to face Bursaspor.
Barcelona, which has won the 32-team tournament twice in the last five years, was all but guaranteed of advancing to the knockout phase when it was picked to play Panathinaikos, Copenhagen and Rubin Kazan in Group D. There are eight groups, each with four teams, and the top two teams in each group advance to the knockout round.
Immediately after the draw, Barcelona was made the 5-2 favorite to win the competition by British bookmaker William Hill. Real Madrid at 9-2, Chelsea at 11-2 and Manchester United at 7-1 round out the top four choices in the betting.
“Teams can look difficult or easy on paper, but you always have to wait and see what test you’ll get on the pitch,” said Andoni Zubizarreta, Barcelona’s sporting director. “It’s true there are no huge names in there.”
Play begins Sept. 14 and the tournament concludes May 28 when the final will be held at Wembley Stadium in London, where Barcelona won its first European championship in 1992.
“Wembley is a stadium that holds special memories for us, and getting there and winning the Champions League is one of our main objectives this season,” Zubizarreta said.
For Bayern Munich, the 2010 runner-up, there appear to be few roadblocks in Group E, which also includes AS Roma, Basel and CFR Cluj.
“It could have been far worse,” Coach Louis van Gaal said. “I’m also glad we have avoided very long flights for the games.”
It is Real Madrid’s group that is the potential barnburner. The Spanish team lured Coach Jose Mourinho from Inter Milan to Madrid and expects him to deliver the goods. Real has not won the competition since 2002.
“We hope that he is the right man to take the team to the title,” Emilio Butragueno, Real’s director of football, said of Mourinho. “It will be very even.”
Said AC Milan Coach Massimiliano Allegri: “It’s an iron-tough group. The San Siro and Bernabeu [stadiums] will be rocking. A spectacle is assured.”
Ajax Amsterdam and Auxerre hope they are not along merely for the ride in Group G.
“When you see AC Milan and Real Madrid in the pool, you know it will be tough,” Ajax Coach Martin Jol said.
“We’ll finish third,” Auxerre Coach Jean Fernandez said, taking a realistic approach.
England is the only country with four teams in the field, including three from London.
Chelsea will play Olympique Marseille, Spartak Moscow and MSK Zilina in Group F. Arsenal faces Shakhtar Donetsk, Braga and Partizan Belgrade in Group H.
Group B features Olympic Lyon, Benfica, Schalke 04 and Hapoel Tel Aviv.
grahame.jones@latimes.com
