2025–26 EHF Champions League

This article is about the men's competition. For the women's competition, see 2025–26 Women's EHF Champions League.
EHF Champions League
2025–26
Tournament information
SportHandball
Dates10 September 2025–14 June 2026
Teams16
Websiteehfcl.com
Tournament statistics
Matches played112
Goals scored6990 (62.41 per match)
Attendance506,566 (4,523 per match)
Top scorer(s)Mathias Gidsel
(120 goals)

The 2025–26 EHF Champions League is the 66th edition of Europe's premier club handball tournament, running from 10 September 2025 to 14 June 2026.

SC Magdeburg are the defending champions.

Format

The tournament will run using the same format as the previous three seasons. The competition begins with a group stage featuring sixteen teams divided into two groups. Matches are played in a double round-robin system with home-and-away fixtures, fourteen in total for each team. In Groups A and B, the top two teams automatically qualify for the quarter-finals, with teams ranked third to sixth entering the playoff round.

The knockout stage includes four rounds: the playoffs, quarter-finals, and a final-four tournament comprising two semifinals and the final. In the playoffs, eight teams are paired against each other in two-legged home-and-away matches (third-placed in group A plays sixth-placed group B; fourth-placed group A plays fifth-placed group B, etc.). The four aggregate winners of the playoffs advance to the quarterfinals, joining the top-two teams of Groups A and B. The eight quarterfinalist teams are paired against each other in two-legged home-and-away matches, with the four aggregate winners qualifying to the final-four tournament.

In the final four tournament, the semifinals and the final are played as single matches at a pre-selected host venue.

Association ranking

Ten of the sixteen teams competing in the group stage will be determined through the EHF association ranking for the 2024–25 season, based on the results of the three previous seasons.[1] The remaining six places will be awarded as wildcards.

  • Associations ranked 1–9 have their league champion qualify for the group stage and can apply their league runner-up for a wildcard.
  • The best-ranked association in the EHF European League can have its league champion and runner-up qualify for the group stage, but cannot apply for a wildcard.
  • Associations ranked outside the top nine can only have their league champion apply for a wildcard.

Participating teams

The first ten teams were revealed on 18 June 2025.[3] The full list was announced on 24 June 2025.[4]

RK Zagreb (1st) Aalborg Håndbold (1st) Barcelona (1st) Paris Saint-Germain (1st)
Füchse Berlin (1st) SC Magdeburg (2nd) One Veszprém (1st) Orlen Wisła Płock (1st)
Sporting CP (1st) CS Dinamo București (1st) GOG Håndbold (2nd) WC HBC Nantes (2nd) WC
SC Pick Szeged (2nd) WC RK Eurofarm Pelister (1st) WC Kolstad Håndball (2nd) WC Industria Kielce (2nd) WC
  • WC Accepted wildcards

Rejected wildcards

FC Porto (2nd) RD LL Grosist Slovan (1st) Kadetten Schaffhausen (1st)

Group stage

Location of teams of the 2025–26 EHF Champions League group stage.
Red: Group A; Blue: Group B.
Main article: 2025–26 EHF Champions League group stage

The 16 teams were drawn into two groups of eight. Teams from the same national association could not be drawn into the same group. The draw took place on 27 June 2025.[4][5]

In the group stage, teams were ranked according to points (2 points for a win, 1 point for a draw, 0 points for a loss). After completion of the group stage, if two or more teams have scored the same number of points, the ranking will be determined as follows:

  1. Highest number of points in matches between the teams directly involved;
  2. Superior goal difference in matches between the teams directly involved;
  3. Highest number of goals scored in matches between the teams directly involved;
  4. Superior goal difference in all matches of the group;
  5. Highest number of plus goals in all matches of the group;
  6. Drawing of Lots

A total of 11 national associations were represented in the group stage. GOG Håndbold came back after a year absence.

Group A

Pos Team Pld W D L GF GA GD Pts Qualification BER AAL KIE NAN VES SPO BUC KOL
1 Füchse Berlin 14 11 0 3 470 433 +37 22 Quarterfinals — 31–28 31–33 34–37 38–34 33–29 32–31 38–27
2 Aalborg Håndbold 14 10 1 3 457 407 +50 21 31–35 — 34–27 31–24 32–28 35–30 34–28 36–24
3 Industria Kielce 14 8 1 5 456 451 +5 17 Playoffs 32–37 32–32 — 27–35 36–35 39–33 34–32 38–27
4 HBC Nantes 14 8 0 6 456 416 +40 16 34–40 27–28 29–33 — 33–31 38–27 35–28 39–24
5 Telekom Veszprém 14 7 0 7 471 449 +22 14[a] 31–32 33–38 35–33 30–25 — 32–31 35–28 42–34
6 Sporting CP 14 7 0 7 465 476 −11 14[a] 37–38 35–33 41–37 28–39 33–32 — 30–29 44–31
7 CS Dinamo București 14 2 0 12 395 430 −35 4 21–27 27–30 24–28 29–28 27–30 30–33 — 33–23
8 Kolstad Håndball 14 2 0 12 386 494 −108 4 28–24 26–35 26–27 26–33 29–43 30–34 31–28 —
Source: EHF
Rules for classification: Tiebreakers
Notes:
  1. ^ a b Telekom Veszprém 64–64 Sporting CP. Veszprém ranked fifth because of the better overall goal difference.

Group B

Pos Team Pld W D L GF GA GD Pts Qualification BAR MAG PLO PAR GOG SZE PEL ZAG
1 Barça 14 13 0 1 492 382 +110 26 Quarterfinals — 21–22 30–24 38–33 37–32 31–28 47–27 46–26
2 SC Magdeburg 14 11 1 2 457 408 +49 23 29–36 — 27–26 37–31 37–30 40–32 36–26 27–22
3 Orlen Wisła Płock 14 8 2 4 424 410 +14 18 Playoffs 24–34 29–29 — 35–32 34–35 30–30 36–25 30–27
4 Paris Saint-Germain 14 6 1 7 446 436 +10 13[a] 27–30 34–26 29–30 — 34–36 29–28 33–27 35–32
5 GOG Håndbold 14 6 1 7 443 468 −25 13[a] 28–41 30–39 28–30 28–31 — 31–36 28–28 33–28
6 SC Pick Szeged 14 5 1 8 428 424 +4 11 27–35 30–34 33–34 31–29 34–37 — 35–20 32–26
7 RK Eurofarm Pelister 14 2 2 10 369 447 −78 6 30–34 26–31 25–28 34–34 28–31 25–24 — 25–23
8 RK Zagreb 14 1 0 13 375 459 −84 2 25–32 35–43 26–34 24–35 31–36 23–28 27–23 —
Source: EHF
Rules for classification: Tiebreakers
Notes:
  1. ^ a b Paris Saint-Germain 65–64 GOG Håndbold

Knockout stage

Main article: 2025–26 EHF Champions League knockout stage

Playoffs

Team 1 Agg.Tooltip Aggregate score Team 2 1st leg 2nd leg
SC Pick Szeged M1 Industria Kielce 2 Apr 8 Apr
Sporting CP M2 Orlen Wisła Płock 2 Apr 9 Apr
GOG Håndbold M3 HBC Nantes 1 Apr 8 Apr
Telekom Veszprém M4 Paris Saint-Germain 1 Apr 9 Apr

Quarterfinals

Team 1 Agg.Tooltip Aggregate score Team 2 1st leg 2nd leg
M4 – Füchse Berlin 29–30 Apr 6–7 May
M3 – Barça 29–30 Apr 6–7 May
M2 – Aalborg Håndbold 29–30 Apr 6–7 May
M1 – SC Magdeburg 29–30 Apr 6–7 May

Final four

The final four will be held at the Lanxess Arena in Cologne, Germany on 13 and 14 June 2026.

Bracket

 
Semi-finalsFinal
 
      
 
13 June
 
 
 
 
14 June
 
 
 
 
 
13 June
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
Third place
 
 
14 June
 
 
 
 
 
 

Final

14 June 2026
18:00 		WSF1 v WSF2 Lanxess Arena, Cologne

Top goalscorers

As of 12 March 2026[6]
Rank Player Club Goals
1 Mathias Gidsel Füchse Berlin 120
2 Elohim Prandi Paris Saint-Germain 111
3 Frederik Bjerre GOG Håndbold 102
4 Melvyn Richardson Orlen Wisła Płock 94
5 Francisco Costa Sporting CP 93
6 Yahia Omar Paris Saint-Germain 85
7 Aleix Gómez Barcelona 84
8 Martim Costa Sporting CP 83
9 Thomas Arnoldsen Aalborg Håndbold 76
Simon Jeppsson Kolstad Håndball

See also

References

  1. ^ "Place distribution released for 2025/26 season". EHF.
  2. ^ "EHF Club Competitions 2025/26" (PDF). eurohandball.com. 2 August 2024. Retrieved 23 December 2024.
  3. ^ "19 clubs registered for Machineseeker EHF Champions League 2025/26". eurohandball.com. Retrieved 18 June 2025.
  4. ^ a b "EHF confirms upgrades to EHF Champions League". eurohandball.com. 24 June 2025. Retrieved 24 June 2025.
  5. ^ "EHF Champions League 2025/26 takes shape after group phase draws". EHF. 27 June 2025.
  6. ^ "Top Scorers". eurohandball.com. Retrieved 12 September 2025.
This article is issued from Wikipedia. The text is available under Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 4.0 unless otherwise noted. Additional terms may apply for the media files.