Brief history of the competition

The UEFA Youth League was originally titled as the UEFA U-19 Champions League, during the two years of trial period of the competition and because of its format, completely equal to the Champions League competition system until the knockout phase (this phase has only single-leg ties, with the semi-finals and final played at neutral venues). This trial started in the season 2013/14 and in this season 2015/16 the competition has become bigger and opener, so 64 clubs, and not only the ones with the senior team in the Champions League, can enter the competition, as we explain in a pair of posts before. 

The origins of this competition are a bit polemical. The British media commented in the first year that this competition wasn’t created only with the laudable purposes that UEFA explains, according to British media, it was also created, or its main objective was, to "limit the growing influence of the NextGen Series* ". 

*The NextGen Series was basically another European football club competition for under-19 footballers founded in 2011. As the UEFA Youth League, it was designed to provide players with the opportunity to match themselves against other elite European footballers of their age group in a competitive environment. The competition was created by sports TV producer Justin Andrews, current Rangers manager Mark Warburton and current Brentford owner Matthew Benham.

And if that was another of the UEFA objectives, we have to recognize that they resulted very successful. The impact of the UEFA U-19 Champions League, even before the first year started, was so big that caused the immediately the suspension of the NextGen Series. On August 2013, organizers confirmed that the NextGen Series had been suspended for the 2013–14 campaign because of funding issues and lacking of competitive space since the creation of the now called UEFA Youth League. 

Before this decision, the NextGen Series organizers try a deal with UEFA with the objective of saving its competition, but were rejected by UEFA. The idea was that the participants of the NextGen Series were clubs that weren’t represented in the UEFA Youth League and the winner or the best performance academies could play in the next UEFA Youth League, basically transforming the NextGen Series in something similar to a qualification play-off. So, maybe the UEFA rejected the idea because was already thinking in implementing this new format of the two paths in the following years. Also they propose to run both leagues in tandem, and that the winners meet in a super-final, but UEFA also rejected.

Returning to the UEFA Youth League, this year the UEFA decide that the competition become a permanent UEFA competition. 

Since this year, the two UEFA Youth League finals have been these ones, both played in the Colovray Stadium of Nyon, Switzerland:

• 2013/14: FC Barcelona beating SL Benfica 3-0 (losing semi-finalist: Real Madrid and Schalke 04).

Munir El Haddadi with 11 goals and 5 assists in the tournament

• 2014/15: Chelsea FC beating Shakhtar Donetsk 3-2 (losing semi-finalist: AS Roma and RSC Anderlecht).

Dominic Solanke, with 12 goals and 4 assists in the tournament

Sons of

The UYL is a competition that allows you to see for the first time players that you din't realized they exist because they are still in a really young age. Sometimes when you check the line ups you notice familiar surnames. This is because the sons of some ex footballers are following the path of their parents. Here is a list of some of the most outstanding surnames you can find this year:

• Justin Kluivert and Joe Van der Sar (Ajax): As their parents, Justin is forward and Joe is the goalkeeper of Ajax. Patrick Kluivert, his dad, was a really good "killer" playing for teams as F.C.Barcelona and Edwin Van der Sar has been on of the best goalkeepers in Manchester United history. 

• Lorenzo di Livio and Alberto de Rossi (Roma): Lorenzo, the son Angelo di Livio a legend of a great team as Juventus, is a really talented "mediapunta". By his way Alberto is the coach of the team and son of the midfielder and actual captain of the Rome, Daniele de Rossi.

• Luca Zidane (Real Madrid) Is the son of one of the most talented players in the history of football. Zinedine Zidane played for teams as Juventus or Real Madrid and won the World Cup with France. His son Luca is the goalkeeper of the sub-19 Real Madrid team and is international for his country. Zinedine had his other son Luca Zidane playing this competition last yar aswell with Real Madrid.

• Adrià Vilanova (F.C.Barcelona). Adrià is the central defender of F.C.Barcelona and is the son of the ex trainer Tito Vilanova who died not long time ago from a cancer while he was the coach of this spanish team.

• Niklas Tarnat (Bayern) Is the midfielder of this german team and son of the ex player of Manchester City and Bayern, Michael Tarnat who was also international for Germany in punctual ocasions.

Based on the original article: "Hijos de" from MarcadorInt

The competition system (II): Domestic Champions Path

This 3rd edition of the UEFA Youth League brings us a main new from the two past editions; the number of participants is going to increase from 32 to 64 teams.

In that way, this year aren't only going to participate the U19 teams of the clubs involved in the Champions League groups phase, but the Domestic Champions in U19 category from the 32 countries with more UEFA coefficient. In the case that one of that Domestic Champions has its senior team in the Champions League groups phase, its place is released for the champion of the next federation of the UEFA ranking, and so on. In this edition, FC Porto, Shakhtar Donetsk, Olympiacos, Maccabi Tel-Aviv and Dinamo Zagreb have allowed that Kazakhstan, Finland, Bosnia, Georgia and Iceland have a team in the UEFA Youth League.

     Today's UEFA's federations classification


For example, an icelandic team can play UYL via UEFA Champions League Path, if their senior team classifies for the Champions League groups phase or via Domestic Champions Path, as they are good enough positioned in the UEFA's federations classification.

Applied to spanish football, Villarreal is playing the UYL as the champion of Copa de Campeones in the Domestic Champions Path while FC Barcelona, Real Madrid, Atlético, Valencia and Sevilla are playing the UYL in the UEFA Champions League Path.


The Domestic Champions Path includes 32 U19 national champions. These teams will play up to two knockout rounds already drawn in a home-and-away format and 8 teams will come out from this.

This 8 teams will play (as the away team) against the 8 2nd classified teams from the UEFA Champions League Path groups in a playoff with the objective of being in the Top 16 knockout. The champions of the UEFA Champions League Path groups will be the home teams in this round.

The next rounds of the competition where already explained in the post "The competition system (I): UEFA Champions League Path"

     On the next days are going to be played the first matches of the second round of the Domestic Champions Path. The 8 winners from this knockout will pass to the next knockout to enter to the Top 16 knockout.


You can follow the results and the details of the matches of the UYL Domestic Champions Path here: http://www.uefa.com/uefayouthleague/season=2016/matches/results/index.html



Source: Una UEFA Youth League mucho más amplia | MarcadorInt

Official Sponsors

UEFA YOUTH LEAGUE Official Sponsors

Uefa Youth League is sponsored by seven different companies of the most prestigious in the world.

At first sight they may seem exactly the same sponsors that the Uefa Champions League but we can see some differences.

These sponsors are:

 

The main differences with the senior competition are:

1. Seven different sponsors, one less than UCL that has eight
2. Heineken and Gazprom are sponsors of UCL but not of UYL
3. Adidas is a sponsor at the same level than the other brands in contrast with what happens in UCL

So do you think that UYL rights for sponsorships should be sold independly from UCL or do you think that could be included and then raise the price of being the sponsors?