1995–96 UEFA Champions League

1995–96 UEFA Champions League

Stadio Olimpico in Rome held the final.
Tournament details
Dates	Qualifying: 9–23 August 1995 Competition proper: 13 September 1995 – 22 May 1996
Teams	Competition proper: 16 Total: 24
Final positions
Champions	Juventus (2nd title)
Runners-up	Ajax
Tournament statistics
Matches played	61
Goals scored	159 (2.61 per match)
Attendance	1,870,462 (30,663 per match)
Top scorer(s)	Jari Litmanen (9 goals)
← 1994–95 1996–97 →

The 1995–96 UEFA Champions League was the 41st season of UEFA's premier European club football tournament, and the fourth since its rebranding as the UEFA Champions League. The tournament was won by Juventus, who beat defending champions Ajax on penalties in the final for their first European Cup since 1985, and their second overall. It was the only Champions League title that Juventus won in the 1990s, despite reaching the next two finals, and one of only three Italian wins in the final, despite there being a Serie A club in every final for seven consecutive years from 1992 to 1998.

It was the first tournament in which three points were awarded for a win instead of two.

Teams[]

24 teams entered the competition – the national champions of each of the top 24 nations in the UEFA coefficient rankings, including UEFA Champions League holders, Ajax. The national champions of the associations ranked 1–7, plus the title holders, all received a bye to the group stage, while the national champions of the associations ranked 8–24 entered in the qualifying round. The remaining national champions from the associations ranked 25–47 were only allowed to participate in UEFA Cup.^[1]

Group stage
AjaxTH (1st)	Nantes (1st)	Real Madrid (1st)	Porto (1st)
Juventus (1st)	Borussia Dortmund (1st)	Blackburn Rovers (1st)	Spartak Moscow (1st)
Qualifying round
Anderlecht (1st)	Aalborg BK (1st)	Legia Warsaw (1st)	Ferencváros (1st)
Beşiktaş (1st)	Göteborg (1st)	Steaua București (1st)	Hajduk Split (1st)
Casino Salzburg (1st)	Rangers (1st)	Rosenborg (1st)	Anorthosis (1st)
Panathinaikos (1st)	Grasshopper (1st)	Maccabi Tel Aviv (1st)	Dynamo Kyiv (1st)

Round and draw dates[]

The schedule of the competition is as follows (all draws are held in Geneva, Switzerland).

Qualifying round[]

Dynamo Kyiv won their tie against Aalborg BK, but, in their first group game against Panathinaikos, they were accused of a failed attempt to bribe the referee, Antonio López Nieto, to get a win. Despite an appeal, they were ejected from the competition and banned for two years, with Aalborg BK replacing them in the group stage. Dynamo's ban was eventually reduced to one season.

Team 1	Agg.	Team 2	1st leg	2nd leg
Grasshopper	2–1	Maccabi Tel Aviv	1–1	1–0
Rangers	1–0	Anorthosis	1–0	0–0
Legia Warsaw	3–1	IFK Göteborg	1–0	2–1
Casino Salzburg	0–1	Steaua București	0–0	0–1
Dynamo Kyiv	4–1	Aalborg BK	1–0	3–1
Rosenborg	4–3	Beşiktaş	3–0	1–3
Anderlecht	1–2	Ferencváros	0–1	1–1
Panathinaikos	1–1 (a)	Hajduk Split	0–0	1–1

Group stage[]

Panathinaikos

Nantes

Porto

Aalborg

Spartak Moscow

Legia Warsaw

Rosenborg

Blackburn Rovers

Juventus

Borussia Dortmund

Steaua București

Rangers

Ajax

Real Madrid

Ferencváros

Grasshopper

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Location of teams of the 1995–96 UEFA Champions League group stage.
Brown: Group A; Red: Group B; Orange: Group C; Yellow: Group D.

11 teams of 16 made their debut in the UEFA Champions League group stage: Aalborg BK, Blackburn Rovers, Borussia Dortmund, Ferencváros, Grasshopper, Juventus, Legia Warsaw, Nantes, Panathinaikos, Real Madrid and Rosenborg. Panathinaikos had already played in the group stage of the 1991–92 European Cup. Aalborg, Ferencvarosi, Grasshopper, Legia and Rosenborg were the first teams to play in group stage from Denmark, Hungary, Switzerland, Poland and Norway respectively.

Group A[]

Pos	Team v t	Pld	W	D	L	GF	GA	GD	Pts	Qualification		PAN	NAN	POR	AAB
1	Panathinaikos	6	3	2	1	7	3	+4	11	Advance to knockout stage		—	3–1	0–0	2–0
2	Nantes	6	2	3	1	8	6	+2	9			0–0	—	0–0	3–1
3	Porto	6	1	4	1	6	5	+1	7			0–1	2–2	—	2–0
4	Aalborg BK	6	1	1	4	5	12	−7	4			2–2	0–2	2–1	—

Group B[]

Pos	Team v t	Pld	W	D	L	GF	GA	GD	Pts	Qualification		SPA	LW	ROS	BR
1	Spartak Moscow	6	6	0	0	15	4	+11	18	Advance to knockout stage		—	2–1	4–1	3–0
2	Legia Warsaw	6	2	1	3	5	8	−3	7			0–1	—	3–1	1–0
3	Rosenborg	6	2	0	4	11	16	−5	6			2–4	4–0	—	2–1
4	Blackburn Rovers	6	1	1	4	5	8	−3	4			0–1	0–0	4–1	—

Group C[]

Pos	Team v t	Pld	W	D	L	GF	GA	GD	Pts	Qualification		JUV	DOR	STE	RAN
1	Juventus	6	4	1	1	15	4	+11	13	Advance to knockout stage		—	1–2	3–0	4–1
2	Borussia Dortmund	6	2	3	1	8	8	0	9			1–3	—	1–0	2–2
3	Steaua București	6	1	3	2	2	5	−3	6			0–0	0–0	—	1–0
4	Rangers	6	0	3	3	6	14	−8	3			0–4	2–2	1–1	—

Group D[]

Pos	Team v t	Pld	W	D	L	GF	GA	GD	Pts	Qualification		AJA	RM	FER	GRA
1	Ajax	6	5	1	0	15	1	+14	16	Advance to knockout stage		—	1–0	4–0	3–0
2	Real Madrid	6	3	1	2	11	5	+6	10			0–2	—	6–1	2–0
3	Ferencváros	6	1	2	3	9	19	−10	5			1–5	1–1	—	3–3
4	Grasshopper	6	0	2	4	3	13	−10	2			0–0	0–2	0–3	—

Knockout stage[]

Bracket[]

	Quarter-finals						Semi-finals						Final
	Borussia Dortmund	0	0	0
	Ajax	2	1	3
							Ajax	0	3	3
							Panathinaikos	1	0	1
	Legia Warsaw	0	0	0
	Panathinaikos	0	3	3
													Ajax	1 (2)
													Juventus (p)	1 (4)
	Real Madrid	1	0	1
	Juventus	0	2	2
							Juventus	2	2	4
							Nantes	0	3	3
	Nantes	2	2	4
	Spartak Moscow	0	2	2

Quarter-finals[]

Team 1	Agg.	Team 2	1st leg	2nd leg
Borussia Dortmund	0–3	Ajax	0–2	0–1
Legia Warsaw	0–3	Panathinaikos	0–0	0–3
Real Madrid	1–2	Juventus	1–0	0–2
Nantes	4–2	Spartak Moscow	2–0	2–2

Semi-finals[]

Team 1	Agg.	Team 2	1st leg	2nd leg
Ajax	3–1	Panathinaikos	0–1	3–0
Juventus	4–3	Nantes	2–0	2–3

Final[]

22 May 1996

20:30

Ajax	1–1 (a.e.t.)	Juventus
Litmanen 41'	Report	Ravanelli 12'
Penalties
Davids Litmanen Scholten Silooy	2–4	Ferrara Pessotto Padovano Jugović

Stadio Olimpico, Rome

Attendance: 67,000

Referee: Manuel Díaz Vega (Spain)

Top goalscorers[]

The top scorers from the 1995–96 UEFA Champions League (excluding qualifying round) are as follows:

Rank	Name	Team	Goals
1	Jari Litmanen	Ajax	9
2	Alessandro Del Piero	Juventus	6
	Raúl	Real Madrid	6
	Krzysztof Warzycha	Panathinaikos	6
5	Patrick Kluivert	Ajax	5
	Yuriy Nikiforov	Spartak Moscow	5
	Nicolas Ouédec	Nantes	5
	Fabrizio Ravanelli	Juventus	5
9	Mike Newell	Blackburn Rovers	4
	Iván Zamorano	Real Madrid	4
11	Erik Bo Andersen	Aalborg BK	3
	Karl Petter Løken	Rosenborg	3
	Reynald Pedros	Nantes	3
	Sergei Yuran	Spartak Moscow	3
	Japhet N'Doram	Nantes	3

See also[]

• 1995–96 UEFA Cup Winners' Cup
• 1995–96 UEFA Cup
• 1995 UEFA Intertoto Cup

References[]

External links[]

• 1995–96 All matches – season at UEFA website
• European Cup results at RSSSF
• All scorers 1995–96 UEFA Champions League (excluding qualifying round) according to protocols UEFA + all scorers qualifying round
• 1995/96 UEFA Champions League – results and line-ups (archive)