by Marvin Somers

Created on: March 11, 2010

The Champions League is the most prestigious of Europe's club competitions in soccer. It features the top teams from around Europe in a season long tournament beginning in September and climaxing in a May final, held at a different stadium each year.

European club competition dates back as far as 1897, but the first true European tournament, the European Champion Clubs' Cup (generally referred to as the European Cup) began in 1955 as a way of sorting out who was truly the best team in Europe. The idea was formed after a series of friendlies held at Molineux, the stadium for British team Wolverhampton Wanderers, in which several teams from several continents were all beaten by Wolves, prompting the British media to declare them the 'Champions of the World'. The European media objected to this presumption and the European Cup was born.

Until 1992, entry to the European Cup was restricted entirely to the top team in each of Europe's leagues, with the exception that the previous season's cup champions were allowed to return to defend their trophy even if (as was often the case) they did not successfully defend their league title. In 1992, that changed, as the influx of television money persuaded UEFA that a change in format would be good. They argued that many of the teams in the top European leagues – such as Italy, Spain and England – were stronger (and better supported) than many of the teams from other leagues, such as Romania or Croatia, and that the tournament should therefore be expanded to include second placed teams in the relevant leagues.

Which leagues were allowed to send two representatives was calculated according to a performance coefficient, which measured the success of teams from different countries over the past five years. Countries with the most success were allowed extra participants, with the list revised every year according to the latest performance.

The re-branding and restructuring of the competition had such success that the number of entries was further extended and in 2009/2010 as many as four entrants from the top three countries are invited. Not all invitations however result in automatic qualification – many teams must pass through up to three qualification rounds before they are allowed into the tournament proper. A full breakdown of permitted entries and performance coefficients is given here.

The tournament itself consists of 32 teams. These teams are divided into eight mini-leagues of four, with teams seeded

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