Five new teams Celtic could face in the Champions League this season

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Celtic supporters around the world are waiting patiently for the UEFA Champions League group stage draw.

Okay, we’ve still got the best part of six weeks to go, and qualifying is only in its early stages. But we’ve known we were going to be in the Champions League group stage since May 7.

We are one of 26 teams already in the hat for the draw on 31 August. Many of the other names are familiar to us, with the likes of Barcelona, Shakhtar Donetsk and RB Leipzig regular opponents over the years.

But there are also a few teams that Celtic have never played in a competitive match. Well, five in total.

Europa League holders Sevilla are one such example. That may be a little hard to fathom given that Celtic have had such a strong relationship with the city of Seville over the years.

We played there for the UEFA Cup final in 2003 that we’d all rather forget. Two seasons ago we were back to take on the city’s other side Real Betis in a Europa League clash.

When Henrik Larsson left the club in 2004 his testimonial was against Sevilla. We won 1-0 that night thanks to a Chris Sutton goal — but a competitive meeting has never been forthcoming. It could be this season with Sevilla confirmed in pot one.

The other major European side we haven’t ever faced competitively is Napoli. The Neapolitans will also be in pot one courtesy of their status as Italian champions.

A meeting with them would be a daunting prospect but they would be fixtures to remember. And they wouldn’t be the toughest side we could get from the top list of teams.

The three other currently qualified teams we are yet to face competitively just happen to be the three below us in terms of UEFA coefficient.

Newcastle United, Union Berlin and Lens are all surprise additions to this season’s competition. All are extremely likely to be in pot four, as are we, so a meeting in the group stage may not be possible.

But there’s always the knockout-rounds.

In other news, Aiden McGeady has found his next Scottish club and taken a new career step