Barcelona in the Champions League: group, rivals, games and dates

We now know the group stage fixtures for the 2023/24 Champions League, with 32 of the continent’s best teams battling it out to be crowned European champions.

Barcelona cruised to the LaLiga title last season to become Spanish champions for the first time since the departure of Lionel Messi. The Catalan club strengthened well in the summer with former Manchester City captain Ilkay Gundogan arriving on a free transfer.

After failing to make it through the group stages in either of the last two seasons, Xavi Hernandez will be desperate to make greater progress this year.

Barcelona’s Champions League draw

Group H: Barcelona, Porto, Shakhtar Donetsk, Royal Antwerp

The draw was made in a grand ceremony in Monaco on Thursday, 31 August. The 32 teams in the group stages were initially split into four pots, with the highest-ranked teams in Pot 1 and the lowest-ranked in Pot 4.

As Spanish champions Barcelona were placed in Pot 1, meaning that they avoided the likes of Manchester City, Bayern Munich and Paris Saint-Germain in the group stage draw.

Champions League schedule and fixture dates

Here are the matchday dates for the group stages of the 2023/24 Champions League...

The exact dates will be confirmed once the draws for the Europa League and Conference League have been made. Teams from the same city will not play on the same night, in a bid to avoid crowd trouble.

Can Barcelona win the Champions League?

Incredibly for a club of the stature of Barcelona, they have made it to the semi-final of the Champions League just once in the last eight seasons. When they did reach the final four in 2018/19 they were eliminated by Liverpool after an extraordinary four-goal turnaround from the Premier League side.

Barça have failed to progress past the group stages in both of the last two seasons but there is reason to believe that they will be able to make it further this time around.

As reigning LaLiga champions they are, on paper, one of the best teams in the competition and they have added greater steel to their team this year. Along with last year’s Champions League-winning captain, Gundogan, they have brought in the experienced Oriel Romeu and Iñigo Martínez.

They face tough opposition, but this could be their best chance in years to progress deep in the Champions League.