Lame Moments in Sports #5

UEFA announces radical changes

Associated Press
7/10/2003

NYON, Switzerland (AP) - European soccer's governing body announced radical changes Thursday to the format for the UEFA Cup tournament, introducing a group stage into the competition.

It used to be so simple. If you were champions of your league, you went into the Champion's Cup, where you played home-and-away ties until there were only two teams left, who played one game against each other for the Cup. If you won the cup, you went into the Cup Winner's Cup, and the process was the same. And, if you did neither, but were still a pretty decent team, it was off to the UEFA Cup with you, and once again it was a simple knock-out competition to the final. And then UEFA decided to get complex. Anyway, I'd better not hear any more complaining from the European football associations about teams playing too many games...