Who can Celtic and Rangers draw in the Champions League?

The Scottish sides will meet some of Europe’s best teams in the elite competition.

Celtic and Rangers look forward to Champions League group stage drawSNS Group

Scotland has two clubs at this stage of the elite competition for the first time since the 2007/08 season.

Celtic qualified directly as Premiership champions, while Rangers beat Union St-Gilloise in the third qualifying round and then beat PSV Eindhoven in the play-off to reach the group stage.

That guarantees some glamour games against the biggest names in European football and the identity of each team’s opponents will be revealed at the draw ceremony in Istanbul at 5pm UK time.

Both sides will be among the bottom seeds when the four-team groups are drawn, meaning an uphill battle to qualify for the knockout stages, or even to reach the Europa League by finishing third in their section.

Real Madrid, Manchester City, Bayern Munich and Paris St Germain are among the Pot 1 sides, while even among the second seeds Liverpool, Chelsea, Barcelona and Juventus lie in wait.

In addition to testing themselves against top-level opposition, the Scottish sides will also be guaranteed a financial windfall of between £30m and £40m thanks to UEFA prize money, payments for each point earned, and broadcast revenue, in addition to the matchday earnings for three games at Ibrox and Celtic Park.

This year’s group stage will take place in a tight schedule so that it reaches a conclusion before the Qatar World Cup in November.

The first matchdays will be on September 6 or 7, with the final games on November 1 or 2.

The 32 teams in the group stage have already been split into their four seeding pots, based on co-efficient points. Celtic and Rangers will each face a team from Pots 1, 2 and 3.

Champions League Group Stage Draw

Pot 1

  • Real Madrid
  • Eintracht Frankfurt
  • Manchester City
  • Milan
  • Bayern Munich
  • Paris St-Germain
  • Porto
  • Ajax

Pot 2

  • Liverpool
  • Chelsea
  • Barcelona
  • Juventus
  • Atletico Madrid
  • Sevilla
  • RB Leipzig
  • Tottenham Hotspur

Pot 3

  • Borussia Dortmund
  • Red Bull Salzburg
  • Shakhtar Donetsk
  • Inter Milan
  • Napoli
  • Benfica
  • Sporting CP
  • Bayer Leverkusen

Pot 4

  • Marseille
  • Club Brugge
  • Celtic
  • Viktoria Plzen
  • Maccabi Haifa
  • Rangers
  • FC Copenhagen
  • Dinamo Zagreb
STV News is now on WhatsApp

Get all the latest news from around the country

Follow STV News
Follow STV News on WhatsApp

Scan the QR code on your mobile device for all the latest news from around the country

WhatsApp channel QR Code