The draw for the round of 16 and subsequent rounds takes place on Friday, at 12pm (Lisbon time), with Sporting having seed status.
Sporting will face Real Madrid or Bodo/Glimt in the round of 16 of the Champions League, after having accessed directly through the league stage.
By finishing in seventh place, penultimate to automatically enter that round, the two-time Portuguese champions avoided the play-offand were left with four possible opponents, however reduced by half.
Os Scandinavians have never faced Sporting and even beat FC Porto and Sporting de Braga last season for the league stage of the Europa League, while the Real Madrid has four wins, a draw and a defeat against the ‘lions’who, in knockouts, conceded in two matches against the Spanish in 1994/95, in the first round of the then-called UEFA Cup.
The draw for the round of 16 and subsequent rounds takes place on Friday, at 11am local time (12pm in Lisbon), in Nyon, Switzerland, with the Sporting to have top seed statusdue to their presence in the top 8 of the league stage.
Except for reaching the ‘fourths’ in 1982/83, in their best result in the previous European Champions Cup, the Lisbon club is for the fourth time, and second in a row, in the knockouts of the Champions League, created in 1992/93, having not surpassed the ‘eighths’ in 2008/09 and 2021/22 and the play-off in 2024/25.
The two legs of the next round are scheduled for March 10th or 11th and 17th or 18th of the same monthrespectively, and Sporting already knows that they will play the first leg away from home and the second at the José Alvalade Stadium.
