|
2015–16 UEFA Women's Champions League
The 2015–16 UEFA Women's Champions League was the 15th edition of the European women's club football championship organised by UEFA, and the 7th edition since being rebranded as the UEFA Women's Champions League. The final was played at the Mapei Stadium – Città del Tricolore in Reggio Emilia, Italy on 26 May 2016, two days before the final of the men's tournament played at San Siro, Milan.[1] Lyon defeated Wolfsburg 4–3 on penalties (1–1 after extra time) to win their third European title.[2] Frankfurt were the defending champions, but were eliminated by Wolfsburg in the semi-finals. Association team allocationA total of 56 teams from 47 of the 54 UEFA member associations participated in the 2015–16 UEFA Women's Champions League. The ranking based on the UEFA Women's Champions League association coefficient was used to determine the number of participating teams for each association:[3]
Association rankingFor the 2015–16 UEFA Women's Champions League, the associations were allocated places according to their 2014 UEFA Women's Champions League association coefficient, which took into account their performance in European competitions from 2009–10 to 2013–14.[4] Spain overtook the Czech Republic in the UEFA coefficient ranking and thus assured themselves a second entry.
TeamsUnlike the men's Champions League, not every association enters a team, and so the exact number of teams in each round can not be determined until the full entry list is known. For this season, the title holders, the champions and runners-up from associations 1–8 and the champions from associations 9–15 entered the round of 32, while the remaining teams entered the qualifying round.[5] The following list the teams that qualified and enter this season's competition. Here TH denotes the title holders, CH denotes the national champion, RU the national runner-up, Ned 1 and Bel 1 the best placed Belgian and Dutch team in their joint league.[6] Gibraltar's champions were still ineligible, as the 2014–15 national league season was again played with only nine players per side. After some years of hiatus Georgia played out a national champion in 2014. For the first time in 12 years Neulengbach from Austria missed out on qualification. Luxembourg entered a team for the competition for the first time since the 2011–12 season. Faroese club KÍ had entered every past edition.[7] Round and draw datesThe schedule of the competition was as follows (all draws were held at the UEFA headquarters in Nyon, Switzerland).[36] In contrast to previous seasons, the round of 16 draw was held after the round of 32 was completed (separately from the round of 32 draw) and was seeded. Moreover, the quarter-finals were now moved back to be played in midweek, with only the semi-finals played on weekends.
Qualifying roundThe draw for the qualifying round was held on 25 June 2015.[37][38] The 32 teams were allocated into four seeding positions based on their 2015 UEFA club coefficients, which took into account their performance in European competitions from 2010–11 to 2014–15 plus 33% of their association coefficient from the same time span.[39] They were drawn into eight groups of four (one from each seeding position), with the restriction that each group had to contain one of the eight teams which were pre-selected as hosts (which were allocated their own designated pot).[40] In each group, teams played against each other in a round-robin mini-tournament at the pre-selected hosts. The eight group winners advanced to the round of 32. The matchdays were 11, 13 and 16 August 2015.
Group 1
Group 2
Group 3
Group 4
Group 5
Group 6
Group 7
Group 8
Knockout phaseIn the knockout phase, teams played against each other over two legs on a home-and-away basis, except for the one-match final. The mechanism of the draws for each round was as follows:
Bracket
Round of 32The draw for the round of 32 was held on 20 August 2015.[41][42] The first legs were played on 7 and 8 October, and the second legs were played on 14 and 15 October 2015.
Round of 16The draw for the round of 16 was held on 19 October 2015.[43][44] The first legs were played on 11 and 12 November, and the second legs were played on 18 and 19 November 2015.
Quarter-finalsThe draws for the quarter-finals and semi-finals were held on 27 November 2015.[45][46] The first legs were played on 23 March, and the second legs were played on 30 March 2016.
Semi-finalsThe first legs were played on 24 April, and the second legs were played on 1 and 2 May 2016.
FinalThe final was played on 26 May 2016 at the Mapei Stadium – Città del Tricolore in Reggio Emilia, Italy.[47] The "home" team (for administrative purposes) was determined by an additional draw held after the quarter-final and semi-final draws.[45]
Attendance: 15,117 Referee: Katalin Kulcsár (Hungary) StatisticsStatistics include qualifying rounds. Top goalscorers
Squad of the seasonThe UEFA technical study group selected the following 18 players as the squad of the tournament:[50] See alsoReferences
External links |
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
