The 1997–98 UEFA Champions League was the 43rd season of the

UEFA Champions League The UEFA Champions League (abbreviated as UCL, or sometimes, UEFA CL) is an annual club football competition organised by the Union of European Football Associations (UEFA) and contested by top-division European clubs, deciding the competi ...

UEFA Union of European Football Associations (UEFA ; french: Union des associations européennes de football; german: Union der europäischen Fußballverbände) is one of six continental bodies of governance in association football. It governs fo ...

's premier club

football Football is a family of team sports that involve, to varying degrees, kicking a ball to score a goal. Unqualified, the word ''football'' normally means the form of football that is the most popular where the word is used. Sports commonly ...

tournament, and the sixth since its re-branding from the "European Champion Clubs' Cup" or "European Cup". The tournament was won by

Real Madrid Real Madrid Club de Fútbol (, meaning ''Royal Madrid Football Club''), commonly referred to as Real Madrid, is a Spanish professional football club based in Madrid. Founded in 1902 as Madrid Football Club, the club has traditionally wor ...

, winning for the first time in 32 years, beating 1–0

Juventus Juventus Football Club (from la, iuventūs, 'youth'; ), colloquially known as Juve (), is a professional football club based in Turin, Piedmont, Italy, that competes in the Serie A, the top tier of the Italian football league system. Founded in ...

who were playing in a third consecutive final. It started a run of three victories in five seasons for the Spanish club. This season was the first to have six groups, instead of previous four, which meant that only two group runners-up qualified for the quarter finals as opposed to all the second-placed teams. It was also the first to have two qualifying rounds instead of just one. After three years of entering the UEFA Cup, champions of smaller nations returned to the Champions League. For the first time, the runners-up of eight domestic leagues entered into the competition. With

Borussia Dortmund Ballspielverein Borussia 09 e. V. Dortmund, commonly known as Borussia Dortmund (), BVB (), or simply Dortmund (), is a German professional sports club based in Dortmund, North Rhine-Westphalia. It is best known for its men's professional fo ...

being the title holders but finishing third in their domestic league last season,

Germany Germany,, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It is the second most populous country in Europe after Russia, and the most populous member state of the European Union. Germany is situated betwee ...

became the first association to provide three teams to the premier European competition. Borussia Dortmund, the defending champions, were eliminated in the semi-finals by eventual winners

Armenia Armenia (), , group=pron officially the Republic of Armenia,, is a landlocked country in the Armenian Highlands of Western Asia.The UNbr>classification of world regions places Armenia in Western Asia; the CIA World Factbook , , and ''O ...

Azerbaijan Azerbaijan (, ; az, Azərbaycan ), officially the Republic of Azerbaijan, , also sometimes officially called the Azerbaijan Republic is a transcontinental country located at the boundary of Eastern Europe and Western Asia. It is a part of th ...

Belarus Belarus,, , ; alternatively and formerly known as Byelorussia (from Russian ). officially the Republic of Belarus,; rus, Республика Беларусь, Respublika Belarus. is a landlocked country in Eastern Europe. It is bordered by ...

Slovakia Slovakia (; sk, Slovensko ), officially the Slovak Republic ( sk, Slovenská republika, links=no ), is a landlocked country in Central Europe. It is bordered by Poland to the north, Ukraine to the east, Hungary to the south, Austria to the ...

and the

Republic of Macedonia North Macedonia, ; sq, Maqedonia e Veriut, (Macedonia before February 2019), officially the Republic of North Macedonia,, is a country in Southeast Europe. It gained independence in 1991 as one of the successor states of Yugoslavia. It ...

all entered their champions for the first time, while the champion of

Yugoslavia Yugoslavia (; sh-Latn-Cyrl, separator=" / ", Jugoslavija, Југославија ; sl, Jugoslavija ; mk, Југославија ;; rup, Iugoslavia; hu, Jugoszlávia; rue, label= Pannonian Rusyn, Югославия, translit=Juhoslavij ...

returned to this competition for the first time since 1991–92 season after the UN ban was lifted.

Association team allocation

Number of teams per country as well as the starting round for each club and seeding were based on 1997

UEFA league coefficient In European football, the UEFA coefficients are statistics based in weighted arithmetic means used for ranking and seeding teams in club and international competitions. Introduced in 1979 for men's football tournaments, and after applied in wome ...

, which takes into account their performance in European competitions from 1992–93 to 1996–97. *Associations ranked 1–8 each have two participants *Associations ranked 9–48 each have one participant (except Liechtenstein and Albania)

Teams

55 teams entered the competition: the national champions of each of the top 48 nations in the UEFA coefficient rankings (except Liechtenstein and Albania), plus the runners-up from each of the top eight nations and UEFA Champions League holders,

. The national champions of the associations ranked 1–7 (Italy, Spain, France, Germany, Netherlands, Portugal and England), plus the title holders, all received a bye to the group stage, while the national champions of the associations ranked 8–16 and the runners-up of the associations ranked 1–8 all entered in the second qualifying round. The remaining national champions from the associations ranked 17–48 entered in the first qualifying round. ;Notes

Round and draw dates

The schedule of the competition is as follows (all draws are held in

Geneva Geneva ( ; french: Genève ) frp, Genèva ; german: link=no, Genf ; it, Ginevra ; rm, Genevra is the second-most populous city in Switzerland (after Zürich) and the most populous city of Romandy, the French-speaking part of Switzerland. Situa ...

Switzerland ). Swiss law does not designate a ''capital'' as such, but the federal parliament and government are installed in Bern, while other federal institutions, such as the federal courts, are in other cities (Bellinzona, Lausanne, Luzern, Neuchâtel ...

, unless stated otherwise).

Qualifying rounds

First qualifying round

Second qualifying round

Losing teams qualified for the first round of the

1997–98 UEFA Cup The 1997–98 UEFA Cup was won by Internazionale in an all-Italian final against Lazio. It was their third title in eight years in the competition. It was the first instance of the UEFA Cup final being a one-game contest at a neutral stadium, ...

. Note: Winning teams of the first qualifying round were drawn against teams qualified directly for the second qualifying round. Because of the unequal number of teams (15 and 17), Wüstenrot Salzburg and

Sparta Prague ) but refer to Spartans as "''Rudí''" ( en, The Dark Reds/The Maroons).'' Letenští'' , ground = Generali Česká pojišťovna Arena , capacity = 19,416 , clubname = Sparta Prague , image = Sparta Praha logo.png , image_size = 160px , fu ...

had to play against each other.

Group stage

Bayer Leverkusen Bayer 04 Leverkusen Fußball GmbH, also known as Bayer 04 Leverkusen (), Bayer Leverkusen, or simply Leverkusen, is a professional football club based in Leverkusen in the state of North Rhine-Westphalia. The club competes in the Bundesliga, t ...

Beşiktaş Beşiktaş () is a district and municipality of Istanbul, Turkey, located on the European shore of the Bosphorus strait. It is bordered on the north by Sarıyer and Şişli, on the west by Kağıthane and Şişli, on the south by Beyoğlu, ...

Košice Košice ( , ; german: Kaschau ; hu, Kassa ; pl, Коszyce) is the largest city in eastern Slovakia. It is situated on the river Hornád at the eastern reaches of the Slovak Ore Mountains, near the border with Hungary. With a population of a ...

Feyenoord Feyenoord Rotterdam () is a Dutch professional football club in Rotterdam, which plays in the Eredivisie, the top tier in Dutch football. Founded as Wilhelmina in 1908, the club changed to various names before settling on being called after i ...

Lierse Koninklijke Lierse Sportkring (), often simply known as Lierse, was a Belgian professional football club from the city of Lier in the Antwerp province. Lierse have won four championship titles and two Belgian Cups. Lierse was one of the six ...

Newcastle United Newcastle United Football Club is an English professional football club, based in Newcastle upon Tyne, that plays in the Premier League – the top flight of English football. The club was founded in 1892 by the merger of Newcastle East En ...

Olympiacos Olympiacós Sýndesmos Filáthlon Peiraiós ( el, Ολυμπιακός Σύνδεσμος Φιλάθλων Πειραιώς, Olympic Club of Fans of Piraeus) is a major multi-sport club based in Piraeus, Greece. Olympiacos is parent to a numbe ...

Parma Parma (; egl, Pärma, ) is a city in the northern Italian region of Emilia-Romagna known for its architecture, music, art, prosciutto (ham), cheese and surrounding countryside. With a population of 198,292 inhabitants, Parma is the second m ...

(who already qualified for the 1991-92 European Cup group stage) and

Sporting CP Sporting Clube de Portugal, founded Sporting Club de Portugal (), otherwise referred to as Sporting CP, often known abroad as Sporting Lisbon , is a Portuguese professional sports club based in Lisbon. It is best known for the professional foot ...

made their debut in the group stage. Košice lost all six of their group stage matches and thus became the first team to finish a Champions League group stage with no points. They were also first team from Slovakia to play in group stage. As of 2022-23, this is the only time Košice, Lierse and Parma played in the Champions League group stage, as well as the last time Göteborg played.

Group A

Group B

Group C

Group D

Group E

Group F

Ranking of second-placed teams

Knockout stage

Bracket

Quarter-finals

The quarter-final between German clubs

Bayern Munich Fußball-Club Bayern München e. V. (FCB, ), also known as FC Bayern (), Bayern Munich, or simply Bayern, is a German professional sports club based in Munich, Bavaria. It is best known for its professional men's football team, which pla ...

and

marked the first meeting of two teams from the same country in the Champions League (including the European Cup era, the first game between teams from the same country occurred in 1958–59). With Bayer Leverkusen also having qualified, it marked the first time three clubs from the same nation played in the knockout phase.

Semi-finals

Final

Top goalscorers

References

External links

1997–98 All matches – season at UEFA website

* All scorers 1997–98 UEFA Champions League (excluding qualifying round) according t

+ all scorer

- results and line-ups (archive) {{DEFAULTSORT:1997-98 UEFA Champions League 1 1997-98