FC Barcelona and Inter in Same Group

FC Barcelona has been drawn alongside Inter Milan, the champions of Italy in the Group F of this season's Champions league. The Ukranian club FC Dynamo Kyiv and the Russian club FC Rubin Kazan completes the group. Eventhough Inter would be a difficult opponent, Barca looks to have found a place in a relatively easy group for next stage qualification. FC Barcelona will open their title defense at Inter Milan on 16th September. This will be the first time Inter and Barca square off after the Ibra-eto swap. FC Barcelona's first home match is against Dynamo Kiev on 29th September. This season draw were expected to churn out some tough groups; but on the final analysis I didn't see any group which can be termed as "Group Of Death". Group E featuring Liverpool, Lyon and Fiorentina is a tough group; but still Lyon and Liverpool ar favourite to go through. Real Madrid has been paired with AC Milan in Group C.

UEFA also announced the UEFA Club Awards of last season. Lionel Messi was elected as the UEFA Club player of the year. He also got the UEFA Club Forward of the Year. Xavi received the UEFA Club midfielder of the year award. Terry and Van Der Saar were elected as best defender and Goalkeeper respectively.

FC Barcelona Seeded Top In Champions League Draw

FC Barcelona as expected has been seeded at the top in the Champions league Draw pot. FC Barcelona is seeded top in the first pot which features Liverpool, Chelsea, Manchetser United, AC Milan, Arsenal, Sevilla and Bayern Munich. The second pot features Lyon, Inter, Real Madrid, CSKA Moscow, FC Porto, AZ Alkmaar, Juventus and Rangers. The pot 3 has the likes of Olympiakos, Marseille, Dinamo Kiev, VFB Stuttgart, Fiorentina, A. Madrid, Bordeux and Beskitas. And finally the final pot has Wolfsburg, Standard Liege, Maccabi Haifa, FC Zurich, Rubin Kazan, Unirea Urziceni, Apoel Nicosia and Debrecen. The presence of Fiorentina, A.Madrid and Stuttgart in Pot 3 and Wolfsburg in pot 4 seriously enhances the chance of having a really bad Group of Death. We have to keep our fingers crossed with that. But the presence of four English teams in Pot 1 enhances their chance of featuring in a so called Group of death - how about Chelsea, Inter, A.Madrid and Wolfsburg in the same group.

Meanwhile FC Barcelona will be playing Shaktar at the UEFA Super Cup finale in Monaco tomorrow. All rumours indicate that Iniesta will be back for this tie. Another news doing the round is the almost signing of Dmytro Chygrynskiy from Shaktar to Barca. It looks certain now but he can only play for us in Spain. Will write more on this once the deal is complete, which should be very soon. Another set of rumours is about the new contract which is ready for Messi - the wumours states that Messi will be earning close to 10 million Euros per year and his buy-out clause will be increased to 300 million. It is yet to be seen whether the likes of Iniesta and Xai will get new contracts in line with the one provided with Messi.

Spanish Super Cup 2nd Leg Pictures