UEFA Champions League predictions, picking the 16 teams to advance: Shakhtar squeak through, Atleti go home

The business end of the Champions League group stages is well and truly upon us with just two rounds of games left, and you can catch all the action on Paramount+. What better time, then, to predict exactly how everything will shake out. Who will be the 16 teams fighting to be in Istanbul come June and which sides will gatecrash the Europa League? Let’s find out:

Group A

Results
Ajax 1, Liverpool 3
Napoli 2, Rangers 0

Liverpool 1, Napoli 0
Rangers 1, Ajax 1

The top two are all but guaranteed in this group and they might just rank among the hardest to read of the likely last 16. One could talk oneself into either Liverpool or Napoli winning the whole thing but in the case of the former it will require a level of consistency that has eluded Jurgen Klopp’s side this season. At their best they could absolutely win out in Group A, albeit not by the margin to wrestle top spot off its current incumbents.

Napoli have been nothing but reliable and yet they have the feeling of last season’s iteration of the Ajax side they have crushed home and away. It might all just be a bit too good to be true. No team can put up an expected goals tally like they have,…