The 2017–18 CERH European League was the 53rd season of Europe's premier club roller hockey tournament organised by CERH, and the 21st season since it was renamed from European Champion Clubs' Cup to the CERH Champions League/European League.
Reus Deportiu were the defending champions. Barcelona won the trophy for a record 22nd time, winning 4–2 over Porto, who lost their 9th consecutive final and 11th overall, 7 of which against Barcelona.
Format changes There are not any format changes in the competition system but, as new, the CERH introduced possession clocks as in basketball. Each possession would have a maximum of 45 seconds.
Team allocation Federation ranking
For the 2017–18 CERH European League, the associations are allocated places according to their Federation points, which takes into account their performance in European competitions from the 2013–14 to the 2015–16 seasons. Points are calculated by dividing the total of points accumulated by the number of participating teams.
Participation in the European League is reserved to that federations that have an effective capacity to organize annually their own national championships. They all will have at least one place. For allocating the other nine places, the D'Hondt method is used with the coefficient of each federation.
In case of resigns, priority will be given according to the order established by the D'Hondt method.
RankAssociationCoeff.TeamsD'Hondt points120.10410.048 6.699 5.024219.799.959 6.640 4.980315.1837.591 5.061 3.79548.8424.420 2.947 2.21056.2713.136 2.091 1.56866.083.042 2.028 1.52173.860colspan=3 83.0011.500 1.000 0.750
Teams League positions of the previous season shown in parentheses (TH: Title holders). As English champions King's Lynn resigned to its place, following the allocation criteria, Italian Follonica occupied its vacant berth.
Participant teams were confirmed on 19 September 2017. Group stage Porto Barcelona Amatori Lodi La Vendéenne Benfica ReusTH Forte dei Marmi Quévert Oliveirense Liceo Viareggio Iserlohn Sporting CP Vic Follonica Montreux
Round dates The schedule of the competition is as follows.
PhaseRoundFirst legSecond legGroup stageMatchday 14 November 2017Matchday 225 November 2017Matchday 39 December 2017Matchday 413 January 2018Matchday 517 February 2018Matchday 610 March 2018Knockout phaseQuarter-finals25 March 20187 April 2018Semi-finals12 May 2018Final13 May 2018
Draw The 16 teams were allocated into four pots, with the title holders, Reus Deportiu, being placed directly as head-team of the Group A. The other three seeded teams will be from the three top ranked federations according to these priorities: National champions of those leagues. Highest ranked teams.
In each group, teams played against each other home-and-away in a home-and-away round-robin format.
The group stage will be drawn on 23 September 2017 in Lisbon. Pots Below are the participating teams (with their points at the CERS ranking). Title holders and the champions of the three top leagues in the ranking were assigned to pot 1, while the rest of the pots were established by nationalities.
+Pot 1 (by Fed. rank)Team Reus80 Porto135 Barcelona160 Amatori Lodi45+Pot 2 (Portugal)Team Benfica155 Oliveirense90 Sporting CP52+Pot 3 (Italy)Team Forte dei Marmi80 Viareggio66 Follonica25+Pot 4 (Spain)Team Liceo100 Vic95+Pot 5 (rest of Europe)Team Quévert65 La Vendéenne36 Iserlohn36 Montreux6
Notes
Group stage
The 16 teams were allocated into four pots, with the title holders, Reus Deportiu, being placed as seeded team in the Group A automatically. The other 3 seeded teams, Porto, Barcelona and Amatori Lodi, were automatically placed in groups B, C and D, respectively. The rest of the teams were drawn into four groups of four, with the restriction that teams from the same association could not be drawn against each other.
In each group, teams played against each other home-and-away in a home-and-away round-robin format.
A total of six national associations were represented in the group stage.
Group A
Group B
Group C
Group D
Knockout phase The knockout phase comprises a quarter-final round and the final four tournament. In the quarter-finals, group stage winners play against group stage runners-up, the latter hosting the first of two legs. The winners qualify for the final four, which will take place at the ground of one of the four finalists.
Quarter-finals
Final Four bracket The Final Four will be played on 12 and 13 May in Porto, Portugal.
Semifinals
Final
See also 2017–18 CERS Cup 2017 CERH Continental Cup 2017–18 CERH Women's European Cup
References
External links Comité Européen de Rink-Hockey (official website)