Champions League draw announced during unique year

The UEFA Champions League is set to be completed in August.

The UEFA Champions League was one of the many sporting events affected by the COVID-19 pandemic. The event froze with several round-of-16 matchups yet to be completed and a format change was announced.

The tournament is now set to be completed in Portugal with the final three rounds being played in a knockout style. All that remained was the draw itself and that was completed Friday morning.

The results should have fans excited.

Champions League returns with a new format.

Two quarterfinal matchups are already set in RB Leipzig vs. Atletico Madrid and Atalanta vs. PSG. What the draw revealed was some dream potential matchups in a knockout format.

There won’t be fans in the stadium, but a potential game between Manchester City and Juventus is enough to have the world watching. The same goes for a Barcelona matchup against Bayern Munich.

As it stands now, Manchester City and Lyon both have one-goal leads in their respective matchups after one leg. Bayern is up three goals on Chelsea and Napoli is tied 1-1 with Barcelona. So the only team that appears to be a lock for the quarterfinals is Bayern.

The action is set to be completed beginning Aug. 7 and the final will take place Aug. 23. This is not a traditional year for sports, but even having the Champions League be completed is a great sign considering the lack of sports being played here in the United States.

It will take some fight but there is still a chance fans can see Cristiano Ronaldo and Juventus take on Real Madrid. There are also some dream finals matchups still out there and the knockout-style tournament will be something to take all our minds off the world for a moment and just enjoy some sports.