{"id":9417,"date":"2026-02-25T02:10:52","date_gmt":"2026-02-25T02:10:52","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/outdoorthrill.cfd\/?p=9417"},"modified":"2026-02-25T02:10:52","modified_gmt":"2026-02-25T02:10:52","slug":"champions-league-last-16-draw-dates-schedule-format","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/outdoorthrill.cfd\/?p=9417","title":{"rendered":"Champions League last-16 draw: Dates, schedule &#038; format"},"content":{"rendered":"<p> <br \/>\n<\/p>\n<div>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">The eight winners of the play-offs will meet the top-eight finishers from the league phase.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">From this point onward the competition adopts a knockout format, with each fixture other than the final contested over two legs.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">As with the play-offs, teams&#8217; final ranking in the league phase will influence seeding in the last 16, with seeded sides &#8211; those that finished in the top eight of the league &#8211; being given the advantage of playing second legs at home.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">This is the first season that the position in which teams have placed in the league phase will also influence seeding for the quarter-final and semi-finals.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Teams finishing first to fourth at the end of the league phase will be seeded for the quarter-finals, and therefore given the home advantage in their quarter-final tie second legs.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">The two sides who finish top and runner-up in the league will also be seeded for the semi-finals, earning them the benefit of playing the second leg of their semis at home should they reach that stage.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">If a seeded team does not progress to the quarter or semi-finals, the team that knocks them out will inherit their seeding position.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p><br \/><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The eight winners of the play-offs will meet the top-eight finishers from the league phase. From this point onward the competition adopts a knockout format, with each fixture other than the final contested over two legs. As with the play-offs, teams&#8217; final ranking in the league phase will influence seeding in the last 16, with<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":9418,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-9417","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-football"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/outdoorthrill.cfd\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9417","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/outdoorthrill.cfd\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/outdoorthrill.cfd\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/outdoorthrill.cfd\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/outdoorthrill.cfd\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=9417"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/outdoorthrill.cfd\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9417\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/outdoorthrill.cfd\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/9418"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/outdoorthrill.cfd\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=9417"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/outdoorthrill.cfd\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=9417"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/outdoorthrill.cfd\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=9417"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}