25 Sep 2026 09:23:53
Given we have 3 weeks to chat among ourselves, just wondering if anyone had ideas for how to the Champions League format could be changed to make it more exciting?
I'd say try to make it feasible with the constraint being it's a money making competition so going back to the old days of knockouts between the actual champions won't happen.
I ask this as I have to admit, the new league table format bores me. Stakes feel so low before knockouts as everyone goes through basically.
25 Sep 2026 10:36:32
Hadn't really ever thought about it Taurus.
25 Sep 2026 11:24:04
Whilst it would mean we would still be on "only" five European Cups and would have played in the competition only twice since 1985, I would like the European Cup to have never become the Champions League in the first place.
League winners only; no second, third, fourth place teams going into the Champions League. No place in the Champions League for winning the Europa League. Two leg knock out matches from the start, no group stages where you can lose three matches and still get through to the next round.
In turn, the UEFA Cup (Europa League) and Cup Winners Cup (no longer exists) would still be much bigger and more prestigious competitions if the European Cup was only for the domestic champions. The rush to make as much money as possible from everything completely changed the landscape of European competition. Europa Conference. don't even get me started on that. Even the Europa League is a mickey mouse competition if the best three or four teams from the major leagues in Europe don't take part in it because they're all in the Champions League.
{Ed025's Note - im with you RR..
25 Sep 2026 11:32:29
Not an easy one to answer.
Whether it was the old format or this new one, the rules for seed/pots and league rivals avoiding each other until the later stages means you end up playing the same pool of teams in the main.
The new league format does give you the opportunity of facing 8 different teams, which is more interesting than 3 home and away.
You could introduce more jeopardy by:
1) Get rid of the play-off and make the final league position a hard qualification.
2) Extend the league matches to 10 or 12 games and top 8 go straight into quarter finals instead of a last 16.
3) Allow league rivals play each other from the outset.
4) Get rid of the pots for league fixture selection.
25 Sep 2026 11:33:13
I like the league format but there's too many poor teams in it.
As for the Europa and the conference league, again some poor sides in it but it's great for smaller clubs and especially their fans to experience a form of European competition.
25 Sep 2026 11:41:13
I agree RR, it did lose the prestige with the change. The UEFA cup used to be more interesting back in the day too. Would quite like it if at the end of the season they ran a competition between champions of the 4 biggest leagues (by coefficient, e. g. England, Spain, Germany, France).
It would be one legged matches, so a semis, then a final, all in neutral venues, all in the space of a week.
I like that FPF, an actual league table where not many go through really would make the beginning stage more interesting. Good recommendation there.
25 Sep 2026 11:53:43
We would only be on 4, RR.
25 Sep 2026 11:43:40
Ed025 – I think we've exchanged thoughts on this before but the frustrating great unknown for Everton will always be what they might have done in the 1985/86 and 1987/88 European Cups having already won the Cup Winners Cup in '85. Could go down a rabbit hole wondering what might have become of Everton longer term if they had won one or two European Cups in the mid to late 80s; could that have become a platform for more success? Doesn't necessarily work like that (e.
g Nottingham Forest 1979 and 1980, Villa 1981) but even as a Liverpool supporter I feel sorry for Everton fans and players from that era who never got the chance.
{Ed025's Note - yeah RR it was very unfortunate mate as we had an excellent team at that time mate, i know its hard to tell but it could have really set us up a European force, the fact that it was not our fault but the fault of our neighbours really stung but its no use crying over spilt milk i suppose..
25 Sep 2026 12:02:51
Rome 1977! - good correction, you're right.
Also no "you beauty, what a hit son, what a hit" - Gerrard v Olympiakos, no Istanbul, no "corner taken quickly. Origi".
25 Sep 2026 12:10:54
We reintroduce the old European Cup, domestic title winners only, no league stages, controversially, no home and away, managers have to compete in a game of "Power Slap" to decide who gets to play at home, bring in golden goal and old-school American-style penalties with the 35-yard run-up, if the game ends in a draw we toss a coin to see which is used, 11 usable subs, no 'technical area' restrictions for managers, 3 yellows instead of 2 and Stevie Wonder on VAR.
25 Sep 2026 12:29:31
Good point there RR, we lose some great moments.
25 Sep 2026 12:52:32
My main problem with it is that a league where you don't either play every team home and away or every team once on a neutral venue is not a true league. It is massively skewed, not just by the seeding but also by the luck of the draw.
There is a time and a place for 'luck of the draw' and that is in true cup competitions like the FA Cup - you might get Arsenal or you might get Accrington Stanley but all the balls are drawn at random from the same pot.
At the moment the CL is neither a true league or a true cup competition. It's a weird hybrid of the 2 and quite frankly it is a pretty boring competition until the quarter finals.
25 Sep 2026 12:57:20
Prefer the new format tbf, the mini league was very repetitive.
25 Sep 2026 14:42:56
Ban PSG that'll make it more exciting.
25 Sep 2026 14:44:29
Ed025 I hate the fact the finger just gets pointed at us for that ban.
I remember that game as a young kid and it was the Italians causing that trouble trowing bits of the rotting stadium into our fans for along time before the reaction came back then it was more UEFA fault for playing the game there because that ground was not safe to have fans in.
I also don't think the Liverpool fans had a bad reputation for trouble in Europe back then like a lot of the English sides especially the London clubs but everyone got painted with the same brush.
Also was it not Maggie that asked for the ban too because of all the trouble in British grounds at the time.
Funny with all the stabbing in Italy and turkey over the years no other country has ever had a ban.
{Ed025's Note - they made an example of the English clubs Grino, 39 people did die (none of them Liverpool fans) and i suppose the authorities had no option but to issue sanctions mate, unfortunately for Everton it effected us more than it did anyone else including the perpetrators, but thats just how it was and its all in the past as far as im concerned..
25 Sep 2026 21:17:50
Liverpool fans were partly to blame; you can't deny that.
There was a lot of bad feeling carried over from the final the year before when Liverpool fans were attacked by Roma fans after we beat them at their home ground. A lot of Liverpool fans wanted revenge on the Italians even though the opposition was different.
Funnily enough, I've heard reports that the attacks in 84 in Rome would have been worse had Lazio's Ultras not come to help out Liverpool fans.