Arsenal drew the names that make a Champions League schedule look brutal. Manchester City drew the schedule that remains brutal after the marquee games are removed. Across the 10 clubs compared here, City have the strongest eight-opponent slate in the 2026/27 league phase.
UEFA doesn’t publish an official strength-of-schedule table, so this comparison uses ClubElo, an independent statistical model that assigns every club a rolling strength rating. The number rises or falls after each match according to the opponent’s quality, the result, home advantage and margin of victory. A higher rating represents a stronger team. Using the latest ratings available when the league-phase draw in Monaco was completed, City’s eight opponents average 1,838, ahead of Paris Saint-Germain at 1,821 and Atlético Madrid at 1,816.
City host PSG, Sporting CP, Napoli and AEK Athens. Their away games are Barcelona, Porto, RB Leipzig and Lens. Seven of those opponents sit inside ClubElo’s current top 28, with AEK the only clear drop. Every City away opponent is also inside that top 28, which removes the low-ranked road fixture most leading clubs received.
The full order is City, PSG, Atlético, Manchester United, Arsenal, Bayern Munich, Barcelona, Liverpool, Real Madrid and Inter Milan. The middle is exceptionally tight. Only six rating points separate United in fourth from Barcelona in seventh, so small changes in form could reorder that cluster before the league phase begins.
Arsenal still have the draw’s most intimidating headline quartet. Real Madrid visit the Emirates, while Arsenal travel to Bayern and Napoli and host Borussia Dortmund. Those four opponents have an average ClubElo rating of 1,915, narrowly higher than the rating for City’s four strongest opponents. Sabah at home, Slavia Prague away and slightly gentler middle fixtures lower Arsenal’s complete average to 1,807. Arsenal’s draw is louder. City’s is deeper.
Why Manchester City have almost no soft edge
The decisive gap appears when each club’s four strongest opponents are removed. City’s remaining four average 1,777. Liverpool are next at 1,737, roughly 40 points lower. The home game against AEK is City’s only obvious mismatch. Porto, Leipzig and Lens make up the rest of the supposedly easier half.
PSG’s draw is more severe at the top. Manchester City, Barcelona, Aston Villa and Roma average 1,917, the highest four-opponent peak in the comparison. PSG must also visit City, Villa, Villarreal and Como, giving them the hardest away average by a narrow margin. Slovan Bratislava at home, however, creates a softer floor than anything in City’s draw.
Atlético and United follow because neither receives much relief between the elite fixtures. Atlético face Bayern, Liverpool and United, then add Stuttgart, PSV and Fenerbahçe. United face Bayern, Atlético, Roma, Sporting, Leipzig and Villarreal before Sabah and Como soften the average. Arsenal’s league-leading squad depth may help them absorb their harder nights, but the rating model measures opponents, not how well each contender is equipped to survive them.
Barcelona’s slate is sharply top-heavy. City, PSG, Aston Villa and Sporting form an elite first half, while Feyenoord, Galatasaray, Como and Sabah pull their overall average down to seventh. Bayern sit just above them because their schedule is steadier, even without a four-game peak as fierce as Barcelona’s.
Liverpool, Real Madrid and Inter occupy the bottom three of this 10-club ranking. Liverpool still visit Inter and host Atlético, but Club Brugge, Villarreal, Fenerbahçe and LASK make the route more forgiving. Real have Arsenal away and Inter at home, offset by PSV, Shakhtar, LASK and AEK. Inter draw Liverpool, Real Madrid and Dortmund, yet Club Brugge, Shakhtar, Feyenoord and Slovan Bratislava leave them with the lowest average of the 10 clubs.
Those ratings aren’t a guarantee of how difficult the opponents will be once the matches begin. Injuries, transfers, venue effects and the match order can change the practical difficulty once UEFA publishes the calendar. City still leave the draw with three claims to the hardest route in this comparison: the highest overall average, the strongest lower half and no low-ranked away trip. Arsenal got the marquee nights. Manchester City got the grind.
