Arsenal faced Bayern, Lyon and Real Madrid in last year's competition. Twente brings a reunion with Jill Roord, Leuven are in their first UWCL, and another trip to Lisbon- this time to take on Benfica.

Arsenal's Champions League league phase opponents: Bayern Munich (a), Lyon (h), Real Madrid (h), Benfica (a), Twente (h), Leuven (a).

Here we go.

Arsenal will host Lyon.

Arsenal will travel to Bayern Munich.

Chelsea will play Barcelona at home.

Here we go then! Time to find out who Arsenal will face.

The match calendar will be released tomorrow.

Teams from the same country cannot be drawn against each other, but they can face a maximum of two teams from another country. Liverpool are playing both Madrid sides in the men's competition, for example.

"It's time to get closer to the draw" - we've been here 18 minutes!!!

Now Netherlands legend Lieke Martens takes to the stage as the next special guest.

"I cried like a baby in the stands seeing the girls do that once again" says Alex Scott of Arsenal's 2025 Champions League win.

Here come a couple of special guests. Alex Scott, who knows a thing or two about winning this competition with Arsenal, is up first.

This year's UWCL final will be in Oslo in May 2026 at the 27,000-capacity Ullevaal Stadion.

Wasn't quite as long as the men's one at least. I've got a cricket dinner at 7pm so they could do with getting on with it a touch.

Oh we do have a UEFA video. Great. Ada Hebergerg is in the Zlatan role.

Arsenal of course are in Pot One after winning the UWCL last season.

Here's UEFA's Nadine Kessler with her trademark banter.

The two other English clubs in the draw are Chelsea and Manchester United, the latter who beat Brann 3-0 last night to win 3-1 on aggregate. Elisabeth Terland scored a hat-trick.

We've got a couple of violinists playing the UWCL anthem, before a shot of Arsenal lifting the trophy in Lisbon. The Gunners will seek to retain their title this season!

Right then, the coverage of the draw is underway. I was told by someone in the know not to expect any of the drawn-out, cringey videos etc that the men's draw came up with, so thank goodness for that.

So, if Arsenal don't finish in the top four, they will play a two-legged play-off game in February in order to then qualify for the quarter-finals. Scheduling wise, that's the only significant difference to last season's comp.

18 teams form the league phase, and here's how it will work. The clubs ranked 1 to 4 at the end of the league phase qualify for the quarter-finals. The clubs ranked 5 to 12 qualify for the knockout phase play-offs. The clubs ranked 13 to 18 are eliminated.

However, fixtures wise, not much has changed. Arsenal will play three home and three away games, but against six different teams rather than being in a group with three others.

As you may well be aware, the group stage is no more in the women's competition, having lasted a season longer than the men's, which reverted to one big league table last season.

Good morning and welcome to Nyon (well, actually my desk in Derby), for coverage of the 2025/26 Women's Champions League League Phase draw. That double use of League is already annoying me.