Rounds of 32 & 16
Tuesday, May 1, 2012
Article summary
The draw for the round of 32 included the top two teams from each of the 12 groups along with the eight sides transferring from the UEFA Champions League after finishing third in their pools.
Article body
14.00CET, 20 December, Nyon
The draw for the round of 32 includes the top two teams from each of the 12 groups along with the eight sides transferring from the UEFA Champions League after finishing third in their pools.
The UEFA Europa League group winners are all seeded, along with the four UEFA Champions League qualifiers with the best record in their section. The other four sides transferring from the elite competition and the UEFA Europa League group runners-up are in the unseeded pot and are drawn first, meaning they are drawn to play the first-leg matches at home. They cannot be paired with either the winners from their section or clubs from the same association.
The draw for the round of 16, which will be played on 7 and 14 March, follows and there are no seeded teams. The 16 balls containing slips of paper for 'Winners of match 1' to 'Winners of match 16' are placed in one bowl and shuffled. The first team drawn are to play their first match at home against the second team drawn and the same procedure is then repeated for the other matches. There are no restrictions on the round of 16 draw.
Round of 32 draw pots
Seeded teams
Liverpool FC, FC Viktoria Plzeň, Fenerbahçe SK, FC Girondins de Bordeaux, FC Steaua Bucureşti, FC Dnipro Dnipropetrovsk, KRC Genk, FC Rubin Kazan, Olympique Lyonnais, S.S. Lazio, FC Metalist Kharkiv, Hannover 96, Chelsea FC*, CFR 1907 Cluj*, Olympiacos FC*, SL Benfica*.
Unseeded teams
FC Anji Makhachkala, Club Atlético de Madrid, VfL Borussia Mönchengladbach, Newcastle United FC, VfB Stuttgart, SSC Napoli, FC Basel 1893, FC Internazionale Milano, AC Sparta Praha, Tottenham Hotspur FC, Bayer 04 Leverkusen, Levante UD, FC Dynamo Kyiv*, FC Zenit St Petersburg*, AFC Ajax*, FC BATE Borisov*.
*Transferred from the UEFA Champions League