Who are the favourites to win the 2024/2025 Champions League?

The 2024/2025 Champions League season will be another interesting campaign in the competition, and we expect top clubs in Europe to fight hard for the crown again.

Real Madrid won their 15th crown in the last campaign as they again dominated Spanish and European football.

Los Blancos are Champions League royalty, and they have bolstered their squad further with the signing of Kylian Mbappe.

Mbappe has been expected to make this move to Madrid since 2022 and will finally arrive in Spain as one of the world’s best players.

Mbappe has broken the scoring record at PSG and won several league crowns, but he clearly could not win the Champions League with the Ligue 1 side.

Last season, it seemed like the Parisians could be European champions finally and they reached the semi-final, but unfancied Borussia Dortmund eliminated them in Mbappe’s final season at the club.

He is now where he can win the Champions League and the Frenchman will play an important role in how they perform.

However, Madrid is not the only club who can win the competition, with Pep Guardiola’s Manchester City also one of the sides that could be champions.

The Citizens remain dominant in English football, and if they had not been eliminated on penalties by Madrid last term, they probably could have retained the Champions League crown.

Barcelona fans will buy Champions League tickets with hopes of finally winning the competition in the post-Lionel Messi era under Hansi Flick.

He won the competition with Bayern Munich in 2020 and they were dominant in every game that they played in that competition. 

If he can take Barca to the level his Bayern team operated on, they could help La Liga to produce the next Champions League winner.

Bayern Munich, Liverpool, Bayer Leverkusen are other clubs who will challenge for the newly expanded Champions League and it will be interesting to see how this season’s competition ends.

Why Madrid can retain the crown

Most football followers will struggle to find another team that is as efficient as Real Madrid in terms of winning the Champions League.

After adding Jude Bellingham to their squad in last summer, they stormed to the Champions League crown at the end of the campaign.

Carlo Ancelotti already had at his disposal arguably the best squad in world football, but Madrid was not satisfied and has added Kylian Mbappe to their squad, alongside Brazilian prodigy, Endrick.

We do not expect much from the latter, but Mbappe is a World Cup winner who scores goals for fun and has his eyes on breaking some records.

The Frenchman arrives in Spain as one of the best-ever frontmen and he will finally replace Karim Benzema.

His arrival means Madrid can now play a devastating front three of Vinicius Junior, Mbappe and Rodrygo, not forgetting Bellingham, who will play behind them.

This attacking force will be a handful for any defence, and as long as they click together in the Champions League, Madrid will be unstoppable.

However, they will miss Toni Kroos after his surprise retirement at the end of last season because he has left a huge hole with one of the biggest legacies in world football.

It will be hard to replace Kroos, but Madrid does not have to replace him because they already have several top quality midfielders who will simply step up and fill the void he has left behind at the club.

Could Pep Guardiola win another Champions League at City

In 2023, Pep Guardiola finally broke his Champions League dock and silenced critics who insisted he could not win the competition without Lionel Messi in his team.

Guardiola dominated the Bundesliga and Premier League before last year, but his team always fell short in the Champions League and lost a close final to Chelsea in 2021.

However, last year, they won the Champions League as a part of a treble-winning season and since then they have gotten better at winning games in the competition.

If they had not lost on penalties to Real Madrid in the knockout stage of the competition last season, they probably would have retained their crown.

This is probably his last season as the manager of Manchester City and he will be looking to bow out in style by winning the Champions League.

Just likes Real Madrid, City has not been very active on the transfer window this summer, but that could be a good thing.

They have a team that won the Premier League last term and retained most of its important players who are the best in Europe.

They can go all the way again, and they are probably the only club that can stop Real Madrid from retaining its crown.

Who are the favourites to win the Champions League

The Champions League will see mostly familiar names competing in it in this edition, and we expect players from the big clubs in Europe to prove their worth.

Some 29 clubs have already qualified for the newly expanded edition of the competition, and the winner is very likely to come from one of them. Which teams are the favourites to win the competition?

Real Madrid

Madrid will always be one of the favourites to win the Champions League, and at the moment, only Manchester City might stop them from winning this season’s edition.

This is why it is smart to invest in Real Madrid tickets on Seatsnet now.

Manchester City

We expect Manchester City to be better than they were last season when Madrid ended their European campaign in the knockout stages.

Although winning the Premier League will require so much from them, Manchester City tickets are selling fast partly because we expect a good showing from them in the Champions League.

Liverpool

Although Liverpool has a new manager, Arne Slot is not an inexperienced boss, and his Feyenoord side reached the final of the first Europa Conference League, where they lost to Jose Mourinho’s AS Roma.

He has the players to do well in Europe, and Liverpool tickets’ buyers are happy with the way their team has performed in pre-season.

Barcelona

With Hansi Flick as their coach, Barca is now one of the favourites to win the Champions League, and Barcelona tickets will sell fast because their fans cannot wait to watch them play as Flick’s Bayern Munich did.

Inter Milan 

Inter Milan reached the Champions League final in 2023 and remains the best team in Serie A, so they are expected to challenge for the Champions League.

Simone Inzaghi’s brilliant work at the San Siro has made Inter Milan tickets one of the best-selling tickets in Europe, and we expect some fine performance from them this term.

PSG

Luis Enrique’s team came close to reaching the Champions League final and winning the competition last season, but they failed to do so.

With Kylian Mbappe leaving, neutrals might think PSG tickets will no longer be fancied, but they are having a good summer and can win the Champions League.

Conclusion

The new Champions League format gives the top European clubs the chance to win the competition, but we expect one of the usual suspects to be champions.