We all season ticket holder of KRC Genk, I am sure that I can buy Champions League tickets! With the current team we probably won’t win any game but it would be a blast to see the world top players at our field! The draw will take place this evening at 18:00 CEST!

The draw

Well the draw is more complicated then it looks! The ground rule is simple. There are 32 teams divided over 4 pots. In pot 1 are the champions of the 6 leading countries on the UEFA ranking and the Champions League and Europa League winner. The other 3 pots are filled based on the UEFA coefficient ranking.

Each group (8 in total) consists of 4 teams, one from each pot. The groups A to D will start in Tuesday and the groups E to F will start on Wednesday. From then on they will switch the weekdays on which the team will play!

Easy isn’t it! But then it get’s more complicated. Teams from the same country may not be drawn into the same group! If a country has 2 or more teams in the draw, one team will have to be in group A to D and the other in E to F. This way one team plays on Tuesday, while to other plays on Wednesday. Since a few year they did add an extra criteria. Teams from Russia and Ukraine may also not be drawn in the same group.

There are 4 countries with 4 teams in the draw. These are England, Italy, Germany and Spain. So half the spots are already filled with these teams!

The pots

So who do I want to see at Genk?

Pot 1

Well some great teams and great players in Pot 1 of the draw. And to be honest it is hard to make a decision. One thing is clear, I don’t want to be paired with Zenit. This is the less appealing club in Pot 1. And although it is the lesser team, Genk will be twice chanceless against them!

PSG at the moment still has Neymar, but probably he will be long gone when the CL starts, leaving only Mbape as star players. So, no not interested in them either.

I do have 3 favorites from pot 1, which are Barcelona, Manchester City and Juventus!

It would be great to see Messi and Suarez in real life! But it is hard to choice between Ronaldo and Messi, but because Genk has a big Italian community Juventus would be great! But maybe the one I do want the most is Manchester City with Debruyne. Debruyne did start his professional career at Genk, so that would be great!

Pot 2

Here 2 clear favorites for me! Real Madrid of course with Hazard and Courtois. And Napoli with Dries Mertens on the other side.

The youngest son is really hoping that Genk will be paired with Ajax. If this will be the case the will buy the ticket from the oldest son for this home game!

Dortmund may not be forgotten either with Witsel. And on top of that a trip between Dortmund and Genk isn’t a big deal!

The only team I do want to avoid is Shaktar. The same reason as with Zenit, probably loosing twice but no real big team. Luckily due to the UEFA rules max one of those 2 can be in our group!

Pot 3

Here I am doubting between an interesting team as Inter Milan or Valencia and a team which maybe allows Genk to win or draw a game.

Inter Milan with Lukaku is my favorite team in this pot. Club Brugge can’t be drawn!

My dream group

While I am a big fan of Genk, I don’t see them have any chance against most teams. To many players of the champions teams did leave the club. So it will be going for the big names!

Pot 1: Juventus because I really want to see Ronaldo playing! But I can also life with City.

Pot 2: Real Madrid without a doubt!

Pot 3: Let’s go for Salzburg, hoping that Genk can at least draw one of those two games.

Will become a little bit nervous around 18 o’clock!

Cheers,

Peter