User:Bmf 051/sandbox/2016–17 CONCACAF Champions League

The CONCACAF Champions League is an annual continental club football competition. The following is a proposed redesign for the current tournament, based on the UEFA Champions League. It is unlikely that such a design would work in reality, because many of the Caribbean Football Union associations could not be relied upon to provide teams on a regular basis (see the low participation for some nations in CFU Club Championship). Also, many associations do not have stadiums that meet FIFA and CONCACAF requirements for hosting matches in a tournament such as this. But this is just an idea.

The tournament would consist of a qualification round and a play-off round, with 10 surviving teams entering the group stage, joining 22 teams that qualify automatically. The 32 teams are drawn into eight groups of four teams and play each other in a double round-robin system. The eight group winners and eight runners-up proceed to the knockout phase that culminates with the two-legged final.

Herediano were the two-time defending champions, but were eliminated in the round of 16 by SuperLiga title holders Toluca. Prior to the tournament, Herediano had defeated Toluca in the 2016 CONCACAF Super Cup.

Pachuca won the tournament, defeating Monterrey 3–1 on aggregate in the final.

Qualification
The CONCACAF Champions League will commence with a double round-robin group stage of 32 teams, which is preceded by two qualification 'streams' for teams that do not receive direct entry to the tournament proper. The two streams are divided between teams qualified by virtue of being league champions, and those qualified by virtue of finishing 2nd–5th in their national championship.

The number of teams that each association enters into the CONCACAF Champions League is based upon the CONCACAF country coefficients. These coefficients are generated by the results of clubs representing each association during the previous five Champions League seasons. The higher an association's coefficient, the more teams represent the association in the Champions League, and the fewer qualification rounds the association's teams must compete in. However, associations are limited to 1 entrant for every 3 teams at the highest level of that associations league system. Teams will qualify based on the results of tournaments completed between July 2015 and June 2016 (some exceptions may be made for some associations if their competitions are completed later, so long as they are completed before teams from that association enter the tournament).

In addition to the previous year's champion, 21 teams qualify directly to the group stage of the tournament from associations ranked 1 through 9. Five of the remaining 10 qualifying places are granted to the winners of a three round qualifying tournament between the remaining 30 national champions, within which those champions from associations with higher coefficients receive byes to the second qualifying round. The other five places are granted to the winners of a two round play-off round between the 12 clubs from associations ranked 1 through 13 (excluding Canada), which have qualified based upon finishing second, third, fourth, or fifth in their respective national league.

The winner of the previous year's SuperLiga will enter in play-off round if they do not qualify for the group stage via their domestic performance. The stream the enter will depend on the rank the Champions League title holder's association.

Sint Maarten will send a team to the competition for the first time, after restarting their domestic league the previous season. As a result, the champions of association 19 will move from the second qualifying round to the first qualifying round.

Tournament
The tournament proper begins with a group stage of 32 teams, divided into eight groups. Seeding is used whilst making the draw for this stage, whilst teams from the same country may not be drawn into groups together. Each team meets the others in its group home and away in a round-robin format. The winning team and the runners-up from each group then progress to the next round.

For this stage, the winning team from one group plays against the runners-up from another group, and teams from the same association may not be drawn against each other. From the quarter-finals onwards, the draw is entirely random, without association protection (in the semifinals, two teams from the same association must be paired with each other). The tournament uses the away goals rule: if the aggregate score of the two games is tied, then the team who scored more goals at their opponent's stadium advances. If the teams are tied on away goals, an 30 additional minutes (two 15 minute periods) of extra time will be played. If the match remains tied, the game will go to penalty kicks. This is a variation of the method used in the UEFA Champions League and other tournaments, the difference being that the away goals rule is not applied after extra time.

Distribution
The table below shows the default access list. Changes will need to be made in the following cases: The final access list will then be adjusted accordingly, with teams entering either earlier or later into the competition in order to ensure that the group stage consists of 32 teams and the play-off round consists of 10 teams per route. None of these changes may cause a league champion to enter earlier than a non-champion from the same association (other than the Champions League and SuperLiga title holders).
 * If both the Champions League title holders and the SuperLiga title holders have qualified for the group stage through domestic performance, the champions of association 10 are moved from the second qualifying round to the play-off round, and the champions of associations 19 and 20 are moved from the first qualifying round to the second qualifying round.
 * If the Champions League title holders have qualified for the group stage through domestic performance while the SuperLiga title holders have not, the SuperLiga title holders enter the group stage through the berth vacated by the Champions League title holders. If the SuperLiga title holders have qualified for any of the qualifying rounds or play-off round through domestic performance, their berth is vacated, and teams of the highest-ranked associations are moved to a later round accordingly.
 * If the Champions League title holders have not qualified for the group stage through domestic performance, there are two sets of changes that may need to be made. If the Champions League title holders have qualified for any of the qualifying rounds or play-off round through domestic performance, their berth is vacated, and teams of the highest-ranked associations are moved to a later round accordingly. Furthermore, if the SuperLiga title holders have not qualified for the group stage through domestic performance, they enter the play-off round, where the section (Champions Route or League Route) depends on the Champions League title holders:
 * League Route: If the Champions League title holders have qualified for any round of the League Route, or have not qualified for the tournament via their domestic league and are from the associations 1–9 in the access list.
 * Champions Route: If the Champions League title holders have qualified for any round of the Champions Route, or have not qualified for the tournament via their domestic league and are from the associations 10–40 in the access list.

Notes:

Association team allocation
A total of 64, 65 or 66 teams from 40 of the 41 CONCACAF member associations are expected to participate in the 2015–16 CONCACAF Champions League (the exception being Montserrat, which haS not organized a domestic league since 2004). Sint Maarten will send a team to the competition for the first time. The association rankings, based on the CONCACAF country coefficients, are used to determine the number of participating teams for each association:


 * Associations 1 and 2 each five teams qualify.
 * Associations 3 and 5 have four teams qualify.
 * Associations 6 and 7 have three teams qualify.
 * Associations 8–13 each have two teams qualify.
 * Associations 4 (Canada), and 14–40 each have one team qualify.

Association ranking (2016–17)
For the 2016–17 CONCACAF Champions League, the associations are allocated places according to their CONCACAF country coefficients. These coefficients take into account their performance in the CONCACAF Champions League from 2011–12 to 2015–16. Associations with the same coefficient are ranked based on the previous year's rankings.

Apart from the allocation based on the country coefficients, associations may have additional teams participating in the Champions League, as noted below:
 * (CL) – Additional berth for Champions League title holders
 * (SL) – Additional berth for SuperLiga title holders

Teams
League positions of the previous season shown in parentheses (TH: Champions League title holders; SL: SuperLiga title holders).

Round and draw dates
The schedule of the competition is as follows.

Qualifying rounds
In the qualifying rounds and the play-off round, teams are divided into seeded and unseeded teams based on their 2016 CONCACAF club coefficients, and then drawn into two-legged home-and-away ties. Teams from the same association cannot be drawn against each other.

First qualifying round
The draw for the first qualifying round was held on 20 June 2016. The first legs were played on 12 and 13 July, and the second legs were played on 19 and 20 July 2016.


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Second qualifying round
The draw for the second qualifying round was held on 15 July 2016. The first legs were played on 26 and 27 July, and the second legs were played on 2 and 3 August 2016.

The second qualifying round is split into two separate sections: Champions Route (for league champions) and League Route (for non-champions). The losing teams in both sections enter the 2016–17 CONCACAF SuperLiga play-off round.

!colspan=6|Champions Route

!colspan=6|League Route


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Play-off round
The draw for the play-off round was held on 5 August 2016. The first legs were played on 16 and 17 August, and the second legs were played on 23 and 24 August 2016.

The play-off round is split into two separate sections: Champions Route (for league champions) and League Route (for non-champions). The losing teams in both sections enter the 2016–17 CONCACAF SuperLiga group stage.

!colspan=6|Champions Route

!colspan=6|League Route


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Group stage
The draw for the group stage was held on 25 August 2016.

The 32 teams were drawn into eight groups of four, with the restriction that teams from the same association could not be drawn against each other. For the draw, the teams were seeded into four pots based on the following principles:
 * Pot 1 contained the title holders and the champions of the top 7 associations based on their 2016 CONCACAF country coefficients. Since the title holders were one of the champions of the top 7 associations, the champions of the association ranked 8th were also seeded into Pot 1.
 * Pot 2, 3 and 4 contains the remaining teams, seeded based on their 2016 CONCACAF club coefficients.

In each group, teams played against each other home-and-away in a round-robin format. The group winners and runners-up advanced to the round of 16, while the third-placed teams entered the 2016–17 CONCACAF SuperLiga round of 32.

Knockout phase
In the knockout phase, teams played against each other over two legs on a home-and-away basis. The mechanism of the draws for each round was as follows:
 * In the draw for the round of 16, the eight group winners were seeded, and the eight group runners-up were unseeded. The seeded teams were drawn against the unseeded teams, with the seeded teams hosting the second leg. Teams from the same group or the same association could not be drawn against each other.
 * In the draws for the quarter-finals onwards, there were no seedings, and teams from the same group or the same association could have been drawn against each other.
 * If any association had sent two teams to the semifinals, those teams would have automatically been paired with each other and the draw would have only been used to determine which team hosted the second leg of each semifinal match-up.

Round of 16
The draw for the round of 16 was held on 12 December 2016. The first legs were played on 14, 15, 21 and 22 February, and the second legs were played on 7, 8, 14 and 15 March 2017.

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Quarter-finals
The draw for the quarter-finals was held on 17 March 2017. The first legs were played on 11 and 12 April, and the second legs were played on 18 and 19 April 2017.


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Semi-finals
The draw for the semi-finals was held on 21 April 2017.The first legs were played on 2 and 3 May, and the second legs were played on 9 and 10 May 2017.


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Final
The first leg of the final was played on 27 May 2017 and the second leg was played on 3 June 2017. The draw was held after the semi-final draw.


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