Rahul Sharma (Editor)

1997–98 UEFA Champions League

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Runners-up
  
Top scorer
  
Attendance
  
2,868,568

Matches played
  
85

Champion
  
Real Madrid C.F.

Dates
  
23 Jul 1997 – 20 May 1998

Goals scored
  
239


Teams
  
24 (group stage)55 (total)

Champions
  
Real Madrid (7th title)

Similar
  
1998–99 UEFA Champio, 1999–2000 UEFA Champio, 2001–02 UEFA Champio, 2002–03 UEFA Champio, 1996–97 UEFA Champio

The 1997–98 UEFA Champions League was the 43rd season of the UEFA Champions League, UEFA's premier club football tournament, and the sixth since its rebranding from the "European Champion Clubs' Cup" or "European Cup". The tournament was won 1–0 by Real Madrid, winning for the first time in 32 years, beating Juventus who were playing in a third consecutive final. It started a run of three victories in five seasons for the Spanish club.

Contents

This season was the first to have six groups, as opposed to four in the previous tournament, which meant that only two group runners-up qualified for the quarter finals as opposed to all the second-placed teams. It was also the first to have two qualifying rounds instead of just one. After three years of entering the UEFA Cup, champions of smaller nations returned to the Champions League. For the first time, the runners-up of eight domestic leagues (three teams: Germany (Bayer Leverkusen, Bayern Munich, Borussia Dortmund as UEFA Champions League title holder); two teams: England (Newcastle United, Manchester United), France (AS Monaco, Paris Saint-Germain), Netherlands (Feyenoord, PSV Eindhoven), Italy (Juventus, Parma), Portugal (Porto, Sporting CP), Spain (Barcelona, Real Madrid) and Turkey (Beşiktaş, Galatasaray) were entered into the competition. The runners-up entered the second qualifying round, while the league winners entered directly the group stage (except for Turkey where both winner and runner-up entered the second qualifying round).

1997–98 UEFA Champions League UCHALEA 9798 FUTBOLSTUFF

Borussia Dortmund, the defending champions, were eliminated in the semi-finals by eventual winners Real Madrid.

Armenia, Azerbaijan, Belarus, Slovakia and the Republic of Macedonia all entered their champions for the first time, while the champion of Yugoslavia returned to this competition for the first time after 1991-92 season and the abolishment of UN ban.

1997–98 UEFA Champions League UEFA Champions League 199798 History UEFAcom

Second qualifying round

Losing teams qualified for the first round of the 1997–98 UEFA Cup.

1997–98 UEFA Champions League WN uefa champions league 199798

Note: Winning teams of the first qualifying round were drawn against teams qualified directly for the second qualifying round. Because of the unequal number of teams (15 and 17), Wüstenrot Salzburg and Sparta Prague had to play against each other.

Group stage

1997–98 UEFA Champions League Real Madrid vs Rosenborg 17091997 Group D Champions League 1997

Bayer Leverkusen, Beşiktaş, Košice, Feyenoord, Lierse, Newcastle United, Olympiacos, Parma, Sparta Prague and Sporting CP made their debut in the group stage.

Ranking of runners-up

1997–98 UEFA Champions League The Togher perspective What if the Champions League had never changed

References

1997–98 UEFA Champions League Wikipedia