Real Madrid winning the 2014 UEFA Champions League. (Photo : Reuters)
Real Madrid CF retained the top spot in the UEFA rankings despite FC Barcelona's 3-1 victory over Juventus FC in the finals of the UEFA Champions League held at the Olympiastadion in Berlin, Germany last June 6.
With the win, Barça gained 38.042 points this 2014-2015 season, the highest among all European clubs, bringing their total UEFA coefficient to 164.9999. It was good enough for second place, seven points short of fellow Spanish team Real, who has an overall score of 171.9999 with 33.042 of those garnered this season, according to The Daily Mirror Online.
Despite Juve's success as a runner-up in the Champions League and accumulating the third highest point total this season at 32.800, the Italian club remains at no. 14 overall in the rankings.
At third overall is Germany's FC Bayern Munich with 154.883 total (31.171, 5th this season), while the English club Chelsea FC settles for the fifth spot with 142.078 (23.714, 10th this season).
Manchester United FC fell at the overall 10th spot with 103.078, despite its strong performances in the past couple of years because the team only scored 2.714 this season.
The rankings are founded on the UEFA coefficient, which is based on earning points according to a list of criteria created by UEFA itself. The criteria are then based on the performance of the competing teams and the results of the UEFA Champions League and UEFA Europa League. Points earned by each club during the five preceding seasons are added to determine the total points of every team respectively. The rankings are established from these total points. (Source: UEFA)
These rankings are used to identify the seeding of the clubs that are participating in the current tournament or event organized by UEFA.
