The most prestigious and sought after prize in European club football is back - The Champions league.

Last season saw a bunch of German's battle it out with Bayern Munich finally take the crown after losing to Chelsea in the 2012 final in penalties and losing to Inter Milan in the 2010 final.

This guy was judged best afield after scoring the match-winner in the 89th minute.



On to the 2013-14 competition

The Contenders:

Bayern Munich:

The defending champions return bigger and better. After one of the most dominant domestic seasons in German history Bayern could be even better this season under the guidance of this dude



Also, now with more Gotze.



Barcelona:

Regarded as the greatest team of all time, Barcelona will view anything short of winning the Champion's League this season a failure.

Basically all you have to know about them is they have the GOAT


Some massively overhyped Brazilian kid


A bunch of old guys


And the GOAT diver


Real Madrid:

Use the word 'contender' very loosely here

Lost Mourinho, still have that little b*tch Ronaldo, don't look like they're going to sign Cavani or Bale. No chance.

Manchester United:

The GOAT coach retired and they bought in David Moyes to replace him who has very little (if any) experience coaching in UEFA competitions. I personally think they might fall off a tiny bit this season.

But, still they have the best striker in the Premier League


Wait, wrong person


As well as some guy that is like 96 years old which has to count for something.


The departure of Ferguson also probably means the end of 'Fergie time' which means this guy is basically irrelevant



Manchester City:

Eliminated in the group stages 2 years running City had enough and sacked coach Roberto Mancini at the conclusion of last season and replaced him with this guy



City's owners are willing to spend about 25 billion dollars in this transfer window just to make it out of the group stage and are reportedly interested in buying Africa and giving it to City players if they can win a Champion's League game.

The team is basically full of pubescent teenage boys who don't know how to shave




And they even have a white guy



Man City threw away any equity they had at this winning this when they sold the true GOAT.







Chelsea:

The return of 'The Special One'

At long last, the manager that Chelsea fans have longed for has returned tot he bidge.

Jose Mourinho, one of the best coaches in the world is back. And more importantly, the Premier League has another coach who will give many gifs.







Roman has reportedly given Jose £100M to spend over the summer to replicate the success that Jose had in his first stint in North London.

Most important for Chelsea's success would be finding a striker who can actually score and hoping Eden Hazard can consistently perform as well as he did at the start of last season.

PSG:

Some French guys with too much money and whose best player has one of the biggest noses in world sport


But can also do this on occasion.


Insert jokes about the French surrendering here.

The other guys:

Borussia Dortmund: Made the final last season but have already lost star MArio Gomez and looks like another star in Robert Lewandowski could be on his way out too.

Arsenal: Been 8 years since they last won any silverware and won't be ending the drought here despite Arsene Wenger reportedly looking to spend big.

Atletico Madrid: Will be very surprised if Falcao is still there come the start of net season, no chance of going far without him.

I think Bayern would be win again in Champions League 2013-14
Because:
-Attack and defense of Bayern were uniform, the ability to support each other very well.
-Also, Bayern's new coach is very good
I think Bayern champion again very high

to OP, should fix that first apostrophe though

Fixed. Good pickup. 2am here an didn't bother checking for errors

Good OP, gonna be interesting with so many of the top clubs having new managers. Bayern are looking as good as any previous winners to retain the trophy but I'd still bet against. It only takes 1 Turkish ref to **** you over.

Good stuff op.


Pity about the poll.

wrong guy again, other than that great op!

Falcao's confirmed at Monaco btw.

Madrid is gonna some non ****ty strikers. Ronaldo will stay.
They have a very good shot.

Carlo goat likely to be joining Real Madrid. They are contenders for sure and in top 3 of most markets. They're still in for Cavani, if reports are to be believed, along with Chelsea. They'll be strong again.

Also, nice OP

What? No Juventus???

Yea, Juventus among the contenders behind Barca, Real, Bayern.

I'd put Juve behind the English teams (not sure About Arsenal but there wouldn't be much in it imo). Pirlo, Buffon and the defence is another year older and until now they haven't upgraded upfront enough. Don't fancy them to go any further than last year.

Current Markets have it as:

Bayern / Barca > Real >>> English - Arsenal >>> Juventus > Others

Hard to judge now until business is done for the Summer of course.

They went out against Bayern Munich on a not embarrasing aggregate. By the end of this summer they are guaranteed to have upgraded enough up front.

Barzagli is 32 but still amazing. Chiellini equally insane not even 30 yo. Bonucci is a pretty sick centre half at 26. Vidal is just one of the best around and Pogba is looking really promising. Look at Pirlo and tell me he dont have at least 1-2 years of awesome still to come. Marchisio fine player. Also they have brought in Llorente who is a monster. I dont think teams gasp of relief if they draw Juve at any time

Ok lolme, I thought Chiellini was nearing 50.

Still not fussed on Juve and their lack of something/spark going forward. They don't retain the ball well enough either.

Donotwant tho if we make the group stages lol.

Juve, knew I'd forgotten someone.

Chelsea & Napoli agreed to a £49M fee for Cavani according to Napoli's official radio station. Should change the market a fair bit

I think Pep is an absolutely amazing coach; however, Heynckes did a ridiculous job at Bayern.

Bayern strong favorites to repeat given the nucleus of their squad+ GOATze.

Also neymar is the real deal.

Buffon is confirmed washed up after that Confed Cup game vs. Brazil.

I guess 4:0 is just on the brink of embarrassing/not embarrassing against us last year. They played pretty well, all things considered; especially in parts of the 2nd leg. Better than Barca anyway.

I guess we're finally accepted to be the favourites now [dancing-market.gif], and while it would be awesome to be the first team to defend the actual Champions League (i.e. not the European Cup), I couldn't look forward to this season in a more relaxed manner.

Last season we finally got that damn monkey off our backs. At ****ing last! And now Lahm, Schweinsteiger, Robben and Ribéry have that big international title which they so much deserve to "legitimize" their careers.

In the end it's a K.O. tournament, and everything can happen even to the best team in the competition, like for example the 2012 semi final has shown. It almost happened to us, too, against Arsenal last season.

Should we go out at one point or another, it will suck, but I won't be heartbroken. (I'm saying that now. LOL me. Of course I will be, but whatever).

Let's go defend The Treble, imo. Now THAT would be a truly sick feat.

Peg is your man

OP was brilliant, nice work.

Biased Chelsea fan but I'm reasonably confident we can at least make the semi's of the CL this season. Can't get much worse than last year's CL campaign though

First qualifying round:

Shirak v Tre Penne

Lusitanos v EB/Streymur

Ties to be played 2/3 and 9/10 July



Second qualifying round:

Neftci v Skenderbeu

Steaua Bucuresti v Vardar

Plzen v Zeljeznicar

FC Sheriff v Sutjeska

Birkirkara v Maribor

Sligo Rovers v Molde

IF Elfsborg v FC Daugava

HJK Helsinki v Nomme Kalju

FK Ekranas v FH Hafnarfjordur

The New Saints v Legia Warsaw

Celtic v Cliftonville

Dinamo Zagreb v CS Fola Esch

Gyor v Maccabi Tel-Aviv

BATE v Shakhtyor Karaganda

Shirak/Tre Penne v Partizan Belgrade

Slovan Bratislava v Ludogorets

Dinamo Tbilisi v Lusitanos/EB/Streymur


Ties to be played 16/17 and 23/24 July

this is Asenal's year to win the champions league, imo.

nice op