Bayern comfortably booked a place in the Champions League first knockout round with five wins from six group matches. The treble winners and 15 other top teams now enter the win-or-bust knockout stages. The men from Munich will find out who they face in the last sixteen next Monday with the draw ceremony at UEFA headquarters in Nyon, Switzerland, starting at midday CET.
Guardiola’s men won their section and will be drawn to play one of the group runners-up. Bayern will also play the first leg of the last sixteen tie away from home. The competition regulations stipulate that teams from the same national association cannot meet at this stage, nor can FCB be drawn to face previous Group D rivals Manchester City. Due to two Bundesliga teams, Bayer Leverkusen and Schalke, having qualified as runners-up in their groups, the list of potential opponents for Bayern is restricted to five.
Bayern’s potential last sixteen opponents:
- Olympiakos Piraeus
- Galatasaray Istanbul
- Arsenal
- Zenit St. Petersburg
- AC Milan
Will there be a rerun of last year’s contest at the same stage against Arsenal? Or a reunion with Anatoliy Tymoshchuk and Zenit St. Petersburg? Perhaps it’ll be the latest edition in the long-running series of encounters with Milan? Could Germany’s biggest club meet Olympiakos Piraeus for the first time since 1980/81? Or will the Bavarians be travelling to the Bosporus for a clash against the Istanbul giants? We’ll keep you up-to-date with all the developments as they unfold here at fcbayern.de.
