Predicting The Last 16 Of The Champions League 2014/15

Group G

Predicted Table: 1. Chelsea 2. Sporting Lisbon 3. Schalke 4. NK Maribor Chelsea seemingly have the easiest group of any of the English teams in the competition. The London club were shrewd in their business during the transfer window, notably bringing in Diego Costa and Cesc Fabregas. These introductions could prove vital in this year€™s Champions League, just as they already have in the domestic league. Costa has a proven track record in Europe and will adjust to European football with Chelsea very quickly. Chelsea are favourites to top this group with relative ease and quickly look to gain momentum for the knockout stages. Sporting Lisbon have spent the last three seasons in the Europa League but now qualify for the Champions League. It remains to be seen whether they can step up and show form in this year€™s contest, however after retaining the services of William Carvalho and regaining Luis Nani, they could pose a threat in this group. Similarly, Schalke often fail to progress from the group stages of the Champions League but this could quite conceivably be the season where they cause upsets against the bigger names. German ace, Julian Draxler, will be key to their success as will Klaas-Jan Huntelaar. They finished third in the Bundesliga last season, almost 30 points behind Bayern Munich, but the Champions League is a completely different proposition. They will be battling with Sporting for second spot, with Chelsea running out clear winners. NK Maribor make only their second Champions League appearance this season after overcoming Celtic in the final stage of the qualifying rounds. In their first appearance, way back in 1999, they conceded 12 goals in just six games and naturally failed to progress. Despite a solid point against Sporting in their opening game Maribor shouldn't cause the teams in this group too many problems and should finish a distant last.