Why Chelsea may face Messi and PSG in the Champions League last-16 tie

The group matches of the Champions League was concluded on Wednesday night with Chelsea, Napoli, Real Madrid, Porto, Manchester City, Tottenham, Bayern Munich and Benfica emerging as leaders of their respective groups while PSG, Liverpool, Porto, Club Bruges, Inter Milan, Eintracht Frankfurt, RB Leipzig and AC Milan ended up as the runners-up of their respective groups.

Many bookmakers may have tipped PSG to finish as leaders of Group H and the Ligue 1 giants rightly appeared to be on course to do so but Benfica’s 6-1 thrashing of Maccabi Haifa away from home was enough to force the French champions settling for the runners-up spot.

Lionel Messi and PSG have finished as Group H runners-up

And Chelsea finishing as leaders of Group E are already scheduled against meeting Liverpool, but not PSG as all Premier League clubs will avoid each other in the last-16 as no sides from the same nation can be paired together in the draw.

Also among the unseeded teams for the last-16 draw are Liverpool, Inter, AC Milan and Borussia Dortmund.

Elsewhere, Real Madrid ensured they finished top of Group F and have joined the likes of Bayern Munich, Napoli and Porto in the seeded pot for the draw.

The Champions League last-16 draw takes place on November 7 at 11am.

The last-16 first legs are scheduled for February 14/15/21/22, while the second legs will take place on March 7/8/14/15.